Breaking The Glass
by EchoCIDE
Summary: Sequel to Vas Domus: A year has passed since a night of terror has seperated them, now Claire finds herself in more trouble than she could have imagined. Someone wants her and her virus and only one man can help her now. Wesker/Claire Rated T for now
1. I: Force

_A/N: Okay, here it is...THE LONG AWAITED FIRST CHAPTER OF THE SEQUEL TO VAS DOMUS! I'm so excited! So much so that I've been dancing in my chair. It's gonna get pretty dirty. Lots of sex and violence may be prevalent here. So as a friend __**I'M WARNING YOU! **__ if what I have said so far will disturb you, you do not want to read. I mean to make no one uncomfortable but somewhere inside of me I feel as if I can push this story to perhaps three or even four installments, and I'm going to push the limits as far as possible to get there. So...enjoy, and for those of you excited to read even though my warning has been heard loud and clear, I URGE you to take this with a grain of salt. It's merely my imagination, nothing else, I mean to offend no one. HERE WE GO!..._

_Oh...right..ahem.._

_**DISCLAIMER: I do not own Resident Evil, or the characters used within. I own only my computer, my OC's, my imagination and a really awesome mini statue of Wesker.**_

**Breaking The Glass**

**Sequel to Vas Domus**

...

**I  
><strong>  
><strong>[Force]<strong>

...

_We can't both become the same pawn that's made to fall  
>Oil that tastes like blood stole the summer scent from me to you<br>You're stabbing me through you, you're stabbing you through him  
>And betting most of this world, we'll add enough of the world<em>

..._  
><em>

A sleek black SUV parked on the pavement outside of the apartment building, shortly followed by another black SUV and a BMW of the same shade. The doors swung open on the larger vehicles in tandem, several men dressed from head to toe in hazmat gear got out, followed by men in combat armor. One of the soldiers stepped to the BMW to open the door on the back passenger's side and a man with blond hair and green eyes placed his perfectly shined shoes on the cement. He was dressed to the nines in an expensive suit and looked as if he had never seen a true day's work in his life.

This couldn't be further from the truth.

"I want this entire building locked down until we have retrieved the subject." His voice was raspy and soft as he instructed the man who had been standing by his side. He moved forward towards the door that read 213 flanked by the hazmat men and the soldiers on all sides.

A small vein protruded from his temple, irritated with the sheer longevity of this particular search and was sure to lose his temper if this turned out to be another false lead. He had been playing some silly wild goose chase with this project and the lead he had received not ten hours ago proved to have just the truth he needed. Or so he hoped.

He knocked on the door and in seconds a man with brown hair and a blue tactical vest appeared. Leon S. Kennedy, he presumed

"Can I help you?" The question was polite enough but he didn't miss the underlying tone of indignancy of having been intruded upon by this stranger. A red haired female appeared behind him, wiping her hands on a dish towel, before Leon could speak the man in black recognized her immediately; after all he had been chasing after her for over a year now.

"Claire Redfield. I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to come with me."

...

Her eyes widened when she saw him, thinking him to be someone else. However uncanny the resemblance was she quickly dispelled the notion. This man had green eyes instead of the blue ones that had haunted her dreams for so long; besides it couldn't be him.

He was dead.

Still it left much to the imagination at how she had ended up at Leon's a year ago and sometimes she wondered if it was _his _doing. Had the half handed method of bringing his vitality back work? Was he still out there, roaming around in the shadows?

These were questions she had asked herself for months after waking up in Leon's bed, the said man frantic about where she had been and what had happened. And all she had to give him for reassurance was a halfhearted 'I don't know'. Soon enough, after patching things up with Leon, she had fallen into whatever life she was leading now and her mind had left _him _behind. And so far she had managed to keep her infection secret enough to go on unhindered and unnoticed. She was sure that if Leon had noticed, he surely would have said something about it. Her life had been uncomplicated and normal for awhile, things had seemed to all die down.

For the most part.

But now this blond stranger who sent warning bells off in her head and seemed to look quite like him was standing at their door and demanding she come with him.

"May I ask what for?" She asked, wringing her hands around the dishtowel nervously. She eyed the personal army behind him and she realized that whoever this man was, he wasn't here for any friendly business. She prayed that there hadn't been some sort of biohazard incident and couldn't help but wonder what she would have to do with something like that anyway?

"Do you have a warrant?" Leon asked, barricading himself between Claire and the man hoping to show that she wasn't unguarded. His only response was a cold smirk as he delivered a punch directly into Leon's gut.

"Don't need one." The brunette fell to his knees as if he had been hit in the stomach with a steel pole, conciousness wavering in and out as the blond walked into the house followed by his men. He ignored Claire's gasp as he spoke to the men, "Subdue her and put her in restraints. We can't risk an incident."

Claire deftly grabbed a kitchen knife that had been on the table behind her and slashed at one of the men swarming her; he leaned out of reach and gripped her arm before she swung out at him.

"Miss Redfield, don't be fool-" The man speaking had been cut off when she delivered a kick to his face and he yelped, cradling his face that was dripping with blood. She had struggled through them for several moments before she felt a pinprick on her neck and she swung around to find the blond man holding an empty syringe behind her. In seconds her eyes closed as she dropped down falling to the floor. One of the men in the combat gear scooped her up and restrained her before removing her from the house.

"Search this house for any evidence and return to the facility in exactly two hours, I will escort Miss Redfield to her new home." The blond turned and left, half of the soldiers following him, leaving the other half and the hazmat men behind.

Once safely inside the sedan he pulled a laptop from under the seat as they took off, the redheaded woman secured in the SUV behind them. A panel of scrolling codes flooded the screen for a moment before a window popped open displaying a map of the Western seaboard. A series of red dots came up gradually along with corresponding times and dates and he couldn't hide the nasty smirk that grew on his face.

It seemed that his brother had been quite the busy man.

...

Droplets of blood splattered the walls in what seemed like a gruesome painting. If one looked close enough they could make out random shapes and patterns; a macabre Rorschach. A symphony of screams rang out through the large and overly embellished conference room as body after body collapsed to the floor, piling up like some sort of corpse landfill. The ones who weren't dead -yet- merely stood frozen in fear as a blur flew past them, snuffing out lives in it's wake. In the end only one survived, a young woman dressed in a powder blue three piece skirt suit with wide blue eyes and bold red hair. She did nothing as the executioner stepped past her, removing a simple USB drive from the laptop at the head of the table before walking out the door. She was frozen to the spot, drenched in blood that wasn't her own, numb and so shocked that had it not been for the evidence all around her she might have not believed it had actually happened. Of course it had, her coworkers all lay dead at her feet. She wanted to cry, or scream out, or even call for help. Instead she stayed still, afraid that he would come back and finish the job.

There was no help now; even the security detail for the building were dead as well. Everyone was dead.

She presumed he had spared her because she was female-a simple receptionist who really had no doing in the affairs of the company she worked for. All of her superiors were male and thus all dead. Everyone who had some crucial part of the inner workings of VitaLife's Sacramento headquarters were now reduced to lifeless corpses. She didn't know her theory about that was terribly wrong, but it didn't matter anyway.

In a daze she grabbed the phone and dialed 911. Had she not been in such a stupor she might have been surprised that the line was still active but she didn't think about it much.

It only took a few minutes before the police sirens filled her ears and she dropped to the floor, feeling overcome with dizziness.

She barely heard the stampeding of heavily booted feet before the door was thrust open.

...

He hadn't killed the girl. There simply was no logical reason to do so. Then again, was there any reason to kill _everyone_ responsible for the company's plans?

Of course there was. If he had let any of them live they would have interfered with his own work and that simply wouldn't do. No, he had spared her because she had no doing in that business save for getting coffee and typing out files; no point. Not to mention, he had a feeling that everyone there didn't account for all parties involved anyway.

That was all, he mused to himself. He knew deep down that there was another reason why he hadn't killed that young secretary although he'd never admit it to himself. The fact that those big blue eyes and that red tinted hair looked like _hers_ was merely a coincidence and nothing else.

During the first few months after leaving her in the care of that Kennedy man he had thought about her often, a little too often for his tastes he'd admit.

Now it had been nearly a year since that night and she hardly entered his thoughts anymore. For all intents and purposes he was done with her.

Or so he kept telling himself.

He was covered head to toe in blood; it almost sickened him to have it on him but such things would have to wait for a better time. He needed to copy the data he had acquired to his own personal files and destroy the original. He never took the time to sit at the desk instead he leaned over sturdy but old computer that was located in an old and abandoned Umbrella facility that he was using as a temporary hideout until he returned to his own lab in Alberta. He pushed in the usb drive, quite thankful that a computer so outdated even had flash drive capabilities at all. He pressed the icon for the drive on the desktop and opened the files, an irritated furrowing of his brow the only outside indication that the several windows that had opened were not what he had expected to find. Most of them were random codes and scripts-trivial and useless business applications. He deleted those, finding no use in such things and was soon about to exit the building empty handed when something popped up in to view.

It was a rather large encrypted file but the encryption was awfully juvenile even if it was locked in several different areas; as if the creator of the file desperately wanted to keep it out of prying eyes but simply didn't know how so he used several novice codes instead of one or two very advanced ones. Another testament to the uselessness and sheer idiocy that was the mockery of this company. He opened another window and his fingers flew across the keyboard almost faster than a human eye could catch, strings and strings of code filling up the box. Soon the file was open and as he clicked it the first thing that popped up was a 3D model of what looked like an Umbrella manufactured tyrant. He pressed another button and the model began to turn as a list flowed down the screen. This was _exactly_ what he was looking for. His eyes quickly roamed through the rest of the lists and files and he felt his smirk widen.

Apparently VitaLife had been working on manufacturing some new virus, as he had suspected. It was a descendant of T and, according to the files, would be able to create an indestructible breed of bio-weapons. He wanted to laugh at this. While the virus itself looked very promising, there was no way that those idiots would have been able to make something of this magnitude. His own team of researchers dating back to his days with Umbrella and through Tricell hadn't even been able to create something that was unable to be destroyed. The _closest _thing that even reached the levels of that kind of power was the G-Virus and all it did was continuously mutate the host until there was nothing left to mutate, eventually leaving the remains in a formless mush.

William had been a clear display of that irrationality.

Even Lisa Trevor, the first successful attempt at B.O.W weaponry, was more apt to immortality than William had been. That girl had been a nuisance in the worst sense. He remembered during his short stint with humanity feeling sorry-bad even-for what had become of the young girl. The reinstatement of the virus coursing through his veins seemed -for the most part - to rid him of those emotions now. Although there was still something he couldn't shake settled in the deepest recesses of his soul.

Or whatever was left of it.

Nonetheless, he couldn't help but snort at those feeble attempts he was reading at the moment. The only virus that could help them now was currently residing in one Claire Redfield and he had gone to great lengths to keep any nosey parties off of her trail.

Even if that band of morons could find a way to make something like that they would never be able to handle that sort of power. Power was one of those things that was a fickle master and it never chose anyone by chance. Too much power could destroy a person if left in the wrong hands.

_'Like you?'_

Certainly not, he reasoned, he was still here wasn't he? He was still alive and well when they weren't. Even the largest thorns in his side had been reduced to nothing.

_'It's not as if you would still be here if it wasn't for-' _ He cut that thought off before it could even finish. He was alive and he was much more powerful than before; that was all that mattered.

All. That. Mattered.

With no time to spare -and a plane to catch- he copied the important parts of the data onto his own personal drive before removing it and swept out of the area briskly. This place had reached it's threshold for usefulness and quite frankly it was an eyesore. He pocketed the drive and strode through corridor after corridor until he reached the elevator. Hitting the switch for the bottom most floor he slid his sunglasses onto the bridge of his nose. His light sensitivity had increased over the past year and he had to purchase even darker glasses recently. It was quite frustrating, which was why he didn't go out often in the daylight hours -not like he usually did anyway- and kept to his business at night. The business of recapturing stolen and purchased Umbrella information was one that required a sense of stealth anyway. Usually, anyway, but his last endeavor had gotten particularly bloody. He hadn't anticipated so many people being there at that time of night and he wanted to leave no trail behind. Unfortunately he left a very large trail but he knew it wouldn't be traced back to a dead man. The girl had barely seen him, hell no one had really seen him.

The elevator jolted to a stop and he walked out, taking a sharp right and entering the large bulkhead-like doors for the power room. A control panel was settled directly in the middle and without so much as a delay he entered the code for the self-destruct. It was probably unnecessary but he never liked to be unprepared and he _always_ covered his tracks, no matter what situation he was in. If there was one thing he knew, it was that with his power and his infamous reputation trouble followed him wherever he went.

He was _the _most wanted man in the world. Or...he was, before he died. Now he wasn't so sure if word had gotten out that he was back, but if it had it wouldn't be too long before commotion followed.

Three minutes was plenty of time to get out of the old facility and he set it for such. He spun through empty corridors with ease, almost surprised when nothing popped out at him with large fangs and claws the size of him alone. History was repetitive so he could be surprised it hadn't happened yet.

Soon enough he was walking on the crisp grass in a forest leading away from the facility. Now it was time to get down to the real business.

...

He had overseen the preparations with ease, pleased that the girl hadn't regained consciousness between the time period of capturing her and placing her in stasis. He couldn't have her running about after all, not with what she had running through her system. A virus like that of T-Veronica was a powerhouse and could be completely unstable. According to the files he had acquired, the creator and last harbinger of it had to place her body in hibernation for fifteen years to prevent it from unstable mutation. In the end, she had still been unsuccessful in containing it and had ultimately been destroyed by his newfound host and her brother. This was something that would not be underestimated by him.

Green eyes roamed the tank that held the girl, curiously wondering just how she had been able to keep the viral mutation from happening with no antivirus whatsoever. It was likely a genetic marker that Alexia Ashford hadn't had, similar to the one that Albert Wesker carried.

He knew the two weren't related, that much was obvious, but there was some kind of link there that he was missing. He knew that the two had spent half a year together shacked up in the Rockies but he had never checked into it far enough to figure out why. When news had reached him that Albert had been purged of his virus he had no need to track the man down; the burden of living as a human was far greater - and more pleasurable to him - a damnation than killing him.

Recent reports however, had brought to his attention the philandering and destruction that Albert had been causing as of late. Taking out several different pharmaceutical companies and stealing their vital information? He knew exactly what the man was up to. It also revealed a clue as to the fact that perhaps he wasn't as mortal as he had thought him to be.

His brother was smart but he had been just the slightest bit sloppy lately, something that lead him on the trail to the elder Wesker.

Alex smirked again, placing his hand on the glass.

The reports had included that the several people killed in Albert's trail had the distinctive trademark that his older brother seemed to favor. Gaping holes in the corpses' chests was a dead giveaway.

When he had received word that his own company had been infiltrated and purged he had been quite pleased, despite the financial setback it had caused, knowing that having a lock on his brother's trail was an irrefutable ticket to getting on his trail.

And when he learned of the little stint Albert had with the ever so lovely Claire Redfield he knew that he had stumbled upon the one thing that might cause him to come out of hiding.

Obviously if the girl had been around during his brother's time without the virus, she had been a valuable personal asset to Albert. And from the way her eyes lit up upon seeing himself, surely recognizing the similar features between he and Albert, her time with him had not been one of great distress for her.

It seemed as if this girl had wormed her way into his brother's weak spot. Perhaps she was his weak spot.

But personal attachment? He found himself clicking his tongue, he had thought his _ever powerful_ brother to be better than that. And with the sister of his long time enemy? Well that was just too delicious.

There had been a strong rivalry from the beginning, Albert being the golden child of Spencer's legacy and Alex had to fight for his chance to be recognized amongst his trail of overachievement. It was always 'Albert' this and 'Albert' that and 'Oh you aren't as advanced as your brother, Albert.' He clicked his tongue again

.

One day that all changed when Spencer came to him, asking for help to keep an eye on his brother who he was afraid had let his position get to his head and had it in mind to usurp Spencer. He agreed but when the time came for Spencer to meet his timely end at the hand of the man he had sung the praises of for so long he had stood in the shadows watching pleased as the old man got what he deserved. Once it was all over, he took it upon himself to take over the secret works that he had been allowed access to after the older Wesker had taken off to fight his own way through the world. Albert went off in the direction of things that had been far above his head and Alex had stayed behind to begin a project of his own.

The development and further research of the Tyrant project was his new baby and it was far more advanced than anything that loon Spencer or his brother could have ever hoped to achieve.

Claire Redfield was the cornerstone of his new success. Sure he hadn't created her but he could certainly use her and her blood to breed an all powerful army of tyrants. The fact that she had shacked up with his brother? Icing on the cake. She'd lead his brother right to him.

He eyed the tank longingly, gliding one hand over it gently.

"You'll be the mother of a new race, my dear."

...

Leon Kennedy's head was pounding so hard that he wasn't sure his brain wasn't hemorrhaging and when he woke up he found with shock that Claire was nowhere in the apartment. He knew immediately that the blond bastard had taken her and the man in question rang some alarming bells from the very beginning.

He had never met him but from every report and photograph he had read and seen, the resemblance to Wesker was nearly uncanny.

He popped several over the counter pain killers before taking his cell phone out and dialing a number he hadn't dialed in so long, he was surprised he remembered it.

Three rings was all it took for her to pick up, _"Hello?"_

"Jill," He exhaled nervously, "It's Leon. I have a serious problem."

_"Oh my god, Leon! What happened? Is it Claire? Is she okay?" _She was frantic with worry and with good reason. He wanted to tell her that yes, Claire was okay but he had to be honest, for Claire's sake.

"I'm not sure what happened," He began truthfully," Some blond guy came to the door with a horde of other men and said that he needed Claire to come with him-"

"_blond guy?" _He could sense the dread in her voice.

"Yeah, I asked him if he had a warrant and he laid me out. Hit me so hard it felt like I had taken a steel girder to the gut. When I woke up, she was gone." He hated having to tell this to Jill, hated to involve her but he knew that if he didn't tell her something she would eventually find out he'd hid it from her. The end result of that would be even worse than what was happening now.

"_Leon," _She started, her voice low as if she didn't want anyone else to hear her, _"It wasn't-"_

"No. I'm pretty sure it wasn't him."

_"How could you tell?"_

"His eyes were green, like an almost startingly shade of green. No sunglasses either, but the resemblance was uncanny. From the pictures I've seen..."

_"So what the hell does this mean? There's a guy running around who looks just like Wes- just like him? That doesn't make any sense."_

"Yeah well, it doesn't matter who he is right now. He took Claire, Jill." Leon sighed, loading his Beretta, the phone shoved between the crook of his shoulder and his neck.

"_You said that there were men with him?"_

"Yeah, a bunch of guys in hazmat suits and combat gear."

"_What would he need a decon team for?"_

"I don't know but...I'm going to find out." Leon said, stuffing some supplies in a small pack. He had developed a sense of protectiveness over Claire and he felt as if it were his duty, not just to Chris, to help her in any way possible. Something wasn't right with this entire situation and he had a feeling that it had something to do with the six months that Claire had been missing for.

_"You can't handle this alone, Leon, I'll take the next flight to D.C and-" _

"No. I didn't want to involve you to begin with but I felt it was better that you know." The woman on the other side went silent for nearly two minutes, thinking about how the girl she had thought of as a sister for so long.

_"Leon," _She began, moving past the lump that was forming in her throat, "_I promised...that I would look after Claire. I can't just leave her like that. Chris," _It was obvious that even talking about her late partner still burned her with great pain and Leon couldn't help but feel bad for her. She was still carrying the memory of a man she had never really gotten the chance to be with,_ "he would have wanted me to make sure she was okay." _

"Shit...alright," Leon said, knowing that if Chris was watching over them he would never forgive Leon if something happened to Jill, "Take the next flight out. Call me as soon as your plane lands, I'll meet you at the airport."

_"Okay. Thanks Leon, I know you and Chris didn't particularly get along but he always thought highly of you."_

"Yeah... I know. Bye Jill."

_"Bye."_

Placing the phone on the table a little harder than he meant to, Leon leaned back in his chair and held his head between his hands. He couldn't help the distinct feeling of dread seeping into his stomach; the exact same dread he had felt once he stepped foot in Raccoon for the first time.

He had no idea that what was ahead would prove to be far more difficult than a few zombies.

...

"Heart rate is steady, as is pulse. Infection level is very high though but no signs of mutation at all, how is that even possible?" Victor Guffy scribbled on his notepad as his wire frames slipped down his nose. He stood about five foot eight but with the bad posture he exhibited he usually seemed a bit shorter. Running a thin pale hand through a head of hair that looked like it hadn't been washed in weeks he typed in something on the computer in front of him and then averted his dark eyes towards the girl in the tank on the other side. He remembered when he was first recruited to be on the research team at Umbrella, or when it used to be Umbrella. The name had long since been abandoned when the scathing words of the Raccoon survivors got out and ensured that the company would be buried along with all of it's secrets in the crater that was formally known as Raccoon City.

Fortunately for him, and his job, when Spencer was reported dead someone else rose to take reigns of the old man's abandoned work.

VitaLife was established soon after, overseen by Alex Wesker.

Under the guise of a normal pharmaceutical company, VitaLife provided the utmost care to keep it's true intentions hidden beneath the surface; it's main laboratory was run out of Russia and had at least six subfloors that he knew about below it.

Very few of it's employees knew the true face of this manufacturer of run of the mill health and wellness products; none of which who hadn't been Umbrella employees previously.

Guffy had been assigned as the head researcher for the third sublevel, that which dealt with diseases such as small pox and rubella. The fact that he was in the sixth sublevel right now was that of a small miracle. Chairman Wesker had hand chosen a team of what he had called his best to oversee the project regarding the host of T-Veronica, whom he had brought in just that morning.

On this same team was Heather Tract, one of the researchers for the fourth sublevel - usually dealing with slightly more dangerous viruses, such as hemorrhagic fevers like Ebola - who was busy dropping some of the host's blood into a vial filled with clear liquid.

"It's strange, the file says that she had been in contact with this virus over a year ago, yet she shows no signs of mental decay, cell death or mutation. What the hell is keeping this virus under wraps?" Guffy said, eyes wide with awe and fixated on the naked woman in the tank.

"I have no idea," Tract said quietly, "Have you checked the body for any sort of sign of mutation?"

"Yeah, nothing that I could see."

"Have you checked her eyes?"

"Her eyes? Yes, but what would that matter?" Guffy looked over increduously. He didn't appreciate this woman second guessing him or his thoroughness in his work. Tract let out a small chuckle, as if having a joke at his expense and he crossed his arms tightly.

"I take it you didn't read _that_ part of the file."

"What are you talking about?"

The woman stood and stretched her arms over her head before walking over to stand next to him at the base of the tank, she waited awhile before speaking, "It says that Miss Redfield here spent over six months with," She lowered her voice, as if worried about being heard even though there was no one else on this level, "Albert Wesker."

"Yeah. And?" Guffy didn't see the point to this and was clearly irritated with Tract.

"And," She started, flipping a switch on the panel to increase the sedative in the tank, "He's the only known person who's body is said to have bonded with the T-Virus. It's basically the same thing as with her. The only noticeable sign of mutation is his eyes."

"Yeah but Wesker doesn't have the virus anymore. What does this have to do with her anyway?"

"I overheard the Chairman the other day, saying something about Wesker and the virus possibly having been reentered into his system." Tract seemed uneasy, knowing all about the fact of the history Alex Wesker had with his brother and if the older Wesker decided to come looking for him it could mean bad business for everyone involved.

"What are you saying?" Guffy was still obviously confused. If he was this dense, she thought, it was by sheer luck he managed to make it in this business as long as he had.

"I'm saying that perhaps he did something to her, recoded her DNA, possibly even given her something that would keep T-Veronica at bay for so long. She was with him for quite some time."

"Well, I checked her eyes. They're normal."

Tract gave a small but sly smile that made him somewhat uneasy, "I guess we have nothing to worry about then. I'm going to hit the hay, if you're staying make sure to up that sedative in an hour. I'll be back at four." She gathered her laptop and locked the keypad on the metal door containing various samples in the temperature controlled enviroment. With a wave of her hand she was gone, beyond various contamination showers and sterile rooms, leaving Guffy all alone with a possibly dangerous specimen. The fact that she was heavily sedated and behind triple reinforced glass did nothing to quell the growing discomfort he had at being near her. He couldn't help but feel quite a bit pride at the situation though. He had been hand picked by the Chairman himself to be on what would possibly be the most important project of his career. A real live carrier of the T-Veronica virus and he got to handle it directly. Despite his unease, he allowed himself a silent pat on the back.

He broke his gaze from the woman floating above him and sat down at the metal office chair in front of the desk with the computer on it. He sighed and rubbed his eyes.

It was going to be a long night.

...

Above ground, in his personal suite on the sixth floor of the facility, Alex Wesker sat in a black leather arm chair, his silver laptop open on his lap. He had been monitoring his brother's actions for hours and found that the man had taken a flight out of New York City and was scheduled to land in Canada in a few minutes. He had thought about meeting his long lost sibling when he landed, but had decided to have him come to him instead.

That way his dear brother could see the surprise he had in store for himself.

He was no fool, he knew that a meeting with Albert could have dire consequences for him if he was not prepared. He may have the Progenitor running through his veins but he did not have the T-Virus that allowed his brother all of his perks.

That was what the Redfield girl was for, amongst other things.

Soon she wouldn't be the only one capable of bonding with T-Veronica and he knew that the potential of T-Veronica far outweighed that of the T-Virus. He would be faster, stronger, and far better than his oh so _perfect_ brother in due time. He just had to ensure that he could produce a strain stable enough that he wouldn't need years of stasis to keep it at bay. As soon as he could ascertain that the virus would be under his control he would have the pleasure of ripping the elder Wesker's heart from his chest. A dream of his that had only grown since their childhood.

He laughed darkly, giddy that his plan was coming along so perfectly.

He snapped his head at the window behind him when the entire facility went dark for a few seconds, followed by the sound of sirens and bright red lights illuminating the outside buildings and towers. His eyes narrowed as he barked towards the ceiling.

"Red Queen, status report." In an instance a panel on the upper wall slid open and was lit with a bright red light.

"It seems that there is an outbreak in the lower levels." The feminine child's voice spoke with clarity and as emotionless as any computer could be.

"Which level did it start in?" He barked, clearly frustrated that this was happening. Those morons in the labs couldn't be trusted to keep anything without his help. He stood hurriedly and threw on his suit jacket, rushing into the hallway and toward the elevator. The voice followed him accurately throughout the halls, speaking clear over the sirens indicating the biohazard.

"My sensors indicate that it began in the sixth sublevel." The elevator doors slid open as if sensing his arrival, the Red Queen bypassing the security codes instantly for emergency and the button for B6 lit up as he stepped in.

"What caused this?" He hissed.

"No information is present. Sensors in sublevels three, four, five and six have just been shut down."

He seethed silently during the ride down. Someone was definitely going to pay for this.

...

_Thirty minutes prior..._

A pair of blue eyes snapped open and with them the entire facility was plunged into darkness, immediately causing a panic, screams filling the halls shortly. A quiet beep was heard to her right as the sound of fluid draining filled her ears and lowered her body to the bottom of the tank. She sighed irritatedly as the glass slid open in front of her and with ease she leapt down to the cold tile below, landing softly on her feet.

It was about time she had gotten out of that thing, she mused, as she snapped her fingers. The entire room was lit in an eerie blue, that of her doing, and as much as hated doing this there was no way she was going to stay in that tank for another day. No sooner than the wailing sounds filled the room did the man who had been keeping watch over her snap up to his feet. She rolled her eyes as he screamed and sped over towards the door, jamming his finger on the keypad next to it in a vain attempt to open it, even though there was no power. She sighed loudly as the door swung open - her doing, mind you -and he stumbled over himself in order to escape.

She didn't want to hurt anyone unless they got in her way, all she wanted to do was get the hell out of there. Unfortunately for her, due to the screams and howls in the hallways ahead, her accidental overload of the systems had apparently let out some nasty things. Or so she figured when the bloody and half eaten corpse of the oily haired man who had just left was thrown at her feet.

Damn, she knew she should have been more careful. She even waited until most of everyone had cleared out of this level for the night to execute this plan; she had been trying to prevent as many casualties as possible.

Even though she had managed to gain proper control over the virus, there were still some things she had problems with and she always tried to prevent abuse of her powers. It wasn't like she had wanted this to begin with. At least she hadn't lost complete control more than twice since she had woken up in Leon's apartment a year ago and lucky for him and her he wasn't present when it happened.

She often wondered why it was she could lose herself to the virus and still manage to come back as if nothing happened. Alexia had mutated to several stages and probably would have continued to do so if she hadn't been stopped.

Stopping at the glass to look into the halls ahead she caught sight of herself and gasped slightly. Somehow she had forgotten how entirely nude she was. She grabbed the lab coat hanging over the office chair that the now dead man had been sleeping at and wrapped it around herself, pleased that it ran to her knees. Buttoning it all the way down she then proceeded to enter the halls, slowly at first and then speeding up as she ensured that nothing remained down there.

She ran through at least half a dozen halls, untouched and unbothered, until she was faced with an elevator that seemed to moving down.

"Aw, fuck." She hissed as she bolted in the opposite direction, knowing that whatever was on the other side of that door, it couldn't be good. She took refuge in the corner of a dark hall when she heard hard footsteps on the tile coming in her direction. She really, really didn't want to have to kill anyone, and she really hoped it wasn't that blond bastard that had taken her.

The fact that he looked almost like _him_ was just too much anyway. A sight of blond in the darkened hall had confirmed her worst.

He apparently hadn't sensed her there as he took a turn into the lab that she had been in previously. Of course in a matter of seconds he'd see that she wasn't there anymore and he'd be looking for her shortly. In a mad dash she made a break for that elevator, knowing that if she could just get past that door without him seeing her, she could make it out of here without being touched.

Once again, luck was not on her side tonight. His head turned swiftly as he raced after her, calling out loudly, "Red Queen, engage elevator shut down!"

She skidded to a halt before making contact with the metal doors as they shut firmly. He was gaining on her, and before she could run off he had latched on to her shoulder.

"Well, well, well, what have we here?" He shoved her against the wall, stronger than that of a normal person. He clearly had similar displays of superhuman strength like Wesker, although they were nowhere near his caliber. Nowhere near hers either, "Be a good girl and get back in your tank." He delivered a swift punch aimed for her head and she ducked to the side with ease, flinging herself on the floor away from him. Distantly she wondered if this man was some relation to _him_. Had to be. The resemblance and the strength wouldn't lie.

"Don't make me hurt you, Miss Redfield. I'm willing to forget the damage and money you've cost me tonight if you agree to back down now." He was bargaining with her? She wanted to laugh. This guy was a joke. He leaned over to appraise her. Maybe he was afraid of touching her? Either way he seemed to be keeping his distance. Probably because he knew she could kick his ass.

"Right, I'll just hop back into that tank just because you asked. Go to hell." Previous reservations forgotten about hurting anyone during her ill-planned break out were lost as she flew upwards, legs first and latched onto his neck with her thighs, pulling him over her.

Soon it was an all out brawl and though she had been attempting to keep her most devastating powers at bay, mostly because the more she unlocked the virus the more she ran the risk of losing control, he was really wearing on her nerves. Not to mention she couldn't keep this up long, channeling all of her mental capacity into shutting down the electricity downstairs. There was no more time to spare and she decided that if she didn't incapacitate him soon, she'd never get out of here.

So she hit him in the face with a punch hard enough to crack bone and smiled triumphantly as he screamed and cradled his nose that was gushing blood like a faucet. She broke free and bolted towards the back, a door that read Fire Exit her main location. She was met with another metal door on the other side, locked by another damn keypad and without thinking, kicked through it with the force of a hundred men. Metal was bent at awkward angles as she flung herself through it and up so many flights of stairs that she had lost count. Victory was close and she shoved open the door at the very top, the smell of fresh air greeting her like an old friend as she thrust herself through.

The ceremonious click of about twenty Assault Rifles met her ears and she swore softly and rose her hands in the air. They were standing in a line, all twenty of them, wearing enough armor to prevent even a multitude of bullets from hurting them. And if that weren't bad enough, the beating sounds of a helicopter rising above the rooftop she was on and the priming of it's own machine turret would have been enough to have her give up and go back to where she came. Would have, had she been the Old Claire.

She slowly turned her head and peered over the edge as one of them spoke, voice distorted through the face cover on his visor, and realized with a mild freak out that she was about twenty floors in the air.

"You are surrounded, give yourself up quietly or we will not hesitate to shoot you down."

A raised eyebrow and quirked lip were the only warnings they got before she bolted towards the edge.

Soon she was flying, the tink-tink-tink of bullet against metal and concrete filling her ears as she fell, mouth and eyes wide open in what could only be described as the greatest high in the world. Wind rushed past her, her hair flying wildly as she fell on and on and when she hit the ground with ease she took off running in the snow as if she had never fallen off a twenty floor building at all.

...

"No, no, no! You incompetent excuses for human beings! You let her get away!" Alex ground out, staring all of the men down with death glares that made them shrink back as a whole.

"Sir, she jumped off the building. There's no way she survived that." The man in front said, trying not to fidget.

"Oh, is that so? Then explain to me, you idiot, why there's not a bloody mess of brains and entrails in the snow?" He motioned over the edge of the rooftop and the leader peered over the side, clearly at a loss for words.

"But how-"

"Do you know what she is, Commander Gleeson? Do you know what she has?" His green eyes burned with fury and it was clear that Gleeson had no idea at all, "I want her found, you hear me? Bring her back to me at once. I don't care if she's dead or alive, if you don't find her by morning I will make sure that you and your useless team are terminated _permanently._ Is that clear?"

"Yes, sir." Gleeson said, who by this time looked as if he might need a change of underwear. He turned back towards his team and motioned to continue the search as the Chairman disappeared back into the building.

He certainly didn't want to be the one who was terminated permanently. If he hadn't been so concerned with the thought of being murdered by his violent boss, he might have noticed the silhouette of the person watching the scene with dark exotic eyes from their post above.

...

Wesker's red eyes widened behind his frames only a fraction of an inch as his phone beeped to indicate an incoming call, with a smirk he answered, knowing that it could only be one person. What a surprise, considering he hadn't heard from her in years.

"Ms. Wong, how nice of you to ring me. What's the occasion?"

_"Always one for formalities, Wesker. Just thought I'd call and say hello."_ Her smooth, velvet voice sighed delicately, though this woman was hardly delicate.

"I'm sure that's just it, Ms. Wong." He couldn't help but smile. It had been so long, after all.

_"There was something I thought you should know though. Consider this one a freebie from an old friend."_ Something in her voice told him that was exactly what is wasn't. Still her informational services weren't cheap to come by and usually if she had information for him it was important enough to warrant those high prices.

"Oh, and what would that be, dear? A shoe store having a sale?" He mocked, although mostly good naturedly.

_"Nothing like that I'm afraid, just thought you'd like to know that a man who seems to look a lot like you recently had an old pal of your's in custody," _ He could hear the smile in her voice but his mouth tightened to that of a stern line, _"That was of course until she made her brave escape off of a roof."_

"Who?" He hissed, his good mood lost in favor of something else, something he didn't want to feel.

_"Well, I didn't catch the name, but she certainly looked familiar. I believe it was the Redfield girl. Claire I think?" _ This was impossible, he reasoned, there was no way.

"You said this man looked like me?" He had to hear it from the horse's mouth herself to believe it.

_"Quite similar, I'd say. You seem surprised."_ The smirk was quite evident on her face even if he couldn't see it. He was a slight bit surprised and he could only imagine what foolhardy scheme his little brother could be concocting with the girl. It could only be something involving the virus she had.

"Where was this, Ms. Wong?" He chose to ignore the snarky side comment, after all his plans had just taken a turn in a more extreme direction.

_"Russia. I don't know the exact name of the city but it's pretty far from civilization. Pretty tight security but nothing I can't handle, I'm sure you'll have no trouble getting there."_

"And she escaped?" He threw on his heavy leather coat and tucked his favored Samurai Edge into the holster attached to his chest, "Which way was she headed?" A long period of silence passed, as if Ada was thinking, "Ms Wong?"

_"Yeah...sorry...just thought I saw something. I'm not sure she made it out the gates yet but she was headed in the direction of Moscow. How she's going to make it there on foot with no shoes in the snow I have no idea. I could...follow her if you like." _Wesker was taken aback, it was unlike her to be so generous with her prized information but he had a feeling that it had less to do with him and more to do with the fact that Claire was close to the object of Ada's affections. She thought he didn't know about it but not many things went past him. Her obvious feelings for the Kennedy were one of those things. She must have known that any harm towards Claire would place Kennedy in an unstable state and probably figured that if she could keep Claire out of danger's way it would help him ultimately.

"No. I've got it under control. Goodbye Ms. Wong."

_"Wesker wait-" _ He did not in fact wait, unable to waste anymore time. He couldn't allow that sniveling little bastard to get his hands on Claire. To allow him the only remaining sample of T-Veronica would be disastrous for more than Wesker and something even deeper than that. Within minutes he was on a helicopter, en route to Russia to find Claire before Alex could.

...

It had been a few hours since she had jumped the fence with enough electric charge to kill a man and now she was treading through the snow at a much slower pace than when she began. The intense burning in her feet had started about ten minutes ago and she knew that if it weren't for the virus she would most likely have collapsed or succumbed to hypothermia by now. She had never praised her infection and she probably never would flaunt it around proudly but she couldn't help but appreciate a bit more.

Thank Wesker for small miracles.

She punched herself mentally, not wanting to think about him ever again if at all possible. She knew that wouldn't happen, as she thought about him in just everything she did. She tugged the lab coat tighter even so around her shivering form, knowing that it wouldn't be long until her decreased temperature would drop even more; the virus could only do so much. At least that merry band of idiots the blond guy had sent after her had gone in the wrong direction in order to retrieve her.

Claire one, blond douchebag zero.

Still she didn't know how long she could keep this up considering she couldn't feel her feet or the bottom half of her legs anymore. Her knees shook from the strain and her joints ached badly from the freezing temperatures. Her head was spinning and her heart beat was slowing to a dangerously slow thud, as if it wanted to give out.

A white expanse of snow covered nothing traveled on as far as she could see and she had to prevent herself from crying out in grief. She walked on further until something black against the white backdrop caught her eye and she broke out into as much of a run as she could manage; more like a floppy stumble, she mused depressed. A large package, wrapped in plain black paper sat in the snow, looking as if it hadn't been there long. She reached for it but stopped herself quickly. There was no telling what was in that seemingly unthreatening package.

Something told her that she had ran out of options about two hours ago, and whatever it was it had to be better than nothing. Unless it was a bomb, which would really suck. It seemed as if it had been left there recently with the intent of her finding it.

With trembling hands she picked it up, slowly unwrapping it, and couldn't contain the squeal of delight at what was inside of it.

In her hands she held a black jacket, a pair of dark blue jeans, a black hoodie sweatshirt, a cozy pair of socks, a pair of leather gloves and pair of black knee high boots. All of which were in her size. Whether it was a trap or someone had been watching out for her she didn't know but she didn't care at the moment and managed to put the entire outfit on in a matter of minutes.

Oh that was _so_ much better.

Once she was better equipped she began to move again, stopping when she felt something hard swing against her leg inside of the coat pocket. She retrieved the contents of the pocket and found a small black wallet in her hand and opened it. There was also a sleek black flashlight.

Inside was exactly five hundred dollars and a little slip of paper. She clicked on the flashlight and skimmed it over the note, reading it slowly.

_It was the best I could do for you at the moment. It should help. On the back of this note is a small map leading into the closest town to you. Be careful._

_-A. Wong_

She searched her brain frantically for the mention of this name and although it seemed very familiar she really couldn't place where she had heard it before. However she was too busy praising this person to worry about it too much. Turning the sheet of paper over she found directions written on top of the map and she exhaled in relief to see that she wasn't too far from civilization after all.

She _still_ didn't know where she was though, country or otherwise. Pending on how cold it was though, she had to deduce that it was a long ways away from the U.S. Hell she didn't know if she was even still in the North American continent. There were some things she did know though, such as that she was most likely in Europe and nowhere near the southern hemisphere. Unless she was in Antarctica, which she doubted. There was no civilization out there anyway, not really. She treaded on, feeling much better than she did before but distantly wondering that if this A. Wong person knew she was out here, why they didn't make themselves known to her. Had they been watching her this whole time?

Were they still watching her?

Another hour passed and when she caught sight of a barely lit up town she broke out into a furious run, the feeling of relief and happiness so great that she wanted to cry. She had enough money here that she could pay for a room to sleep in and get some food and maybe even supplies. If she ever met this A. Wong, she would make it first priority to kiss them right on the mouth.

She made it into town and blended into the small groups of people walking past, noting that they seemed to be speaking Russian. This was kind of disheartening, considering she didn't know a word of the language. She just had to hope that she wouldn't need to.

Fortunately however, it appeared to be a quite pleasant town and it's occupants didn't give her any strange once overs. They either flashed her a small quick smile in passing or ignored her altogether.

Soon enough she had located what she hoped was a motel, which it was, and stepped through the door, exhaling in relief at the warm air that wrapped her in it's arms. The interior was cozy looking, much like that of someone's home and if it hadn't been for the set of older elevators near the back she may have thought that's where she was. There was an older lady behind the counter, with a head of long graying brown hair and ice blue eyes. She had her nose buried in a book, and Claire noted with appreciation that it was a Dean Koontz novel. A rather good one, she mused.

This also showed that the woman most likely spoke English. Something that made Claire feel loads better.

"Excuse me?" Claire spoke softly, not wanting to startle the lady. The woman's eyes snapped up at her and a large smile crossed her pretty face.

"Ahh hello. An american, yes? We don't get many of you around here. Vot can I do for you, dear?" Her English was quite good and Claire relaxed upon the realization that the woman seemed to appreciate her heritage instead of reacting to it the way Chris had told her all Russians would. Considering she had only ever met one Russian in her life and he had been an asshole who tried to rape and kill her and murdered Wesker, she hadn't much to go on.

"Yes, ma'am. I'd like a room for the night. Do you accept American currency?" Claire fidgeted with her wallet, feeling still a bit nervous.

"Of course. Vill that be one or two beds?"

"Just one, please." Claire smiled at the lady, sincerly hoping that all of the people in the town were just as nice.

"And vot's your name, dear?" She asked, writing something in a book on the desk.

Claire froze, unsure of whether to give her actual name. Instead she blurted the first thing that came to mind, not really caring if it sounded real or not.

"Sharon White."

"Alright. There you go, dear. Checkout is at 2 and there's a phone. Just dial 9 to go out and dial 1 for the front desk. If there is anything I can do for you, let me know." She reached under the desk and handed Claire a shiny key with a tag attached to it that read 304,"Your room is on the third floor."

"Thank you so much, how much do I owe you?" She reached for the money in her wallet , expecting the bill to be lengthy.

"That vould be thirty dollars in American cash." Claire almost choked.

"Wow, that's all?"

"American money is vorth quite a bit more than rubles here, dear." The lady said with a small laugh, "You haven't been in Russia long, have you?"

"Actually, no. I was kind of just...dropped here."

"Vell you needn't vorry. Like I said, if you need help vith anything, just ask."

Claire moved towards the elevator, thanking the woman again. She probably should have asked where the best place to eat or get clothes was but right now sleep called to her. Her condition generally didn't call for much sleep or food but under the right amount of strain and duress it would buckle and she would give in.

It made her feel just the tiniest bit more human.

Absently, as she rode the old elevator up, she wondered if Wesker required food in his virally enhanced state. She was sure he did but like her not often.

She shook herself mentally, clearing all thoughts of the man she had come to grow feelings for despite what he was.

He hadn't been the same when she knew him.

She honestly didn't know if he was even alive really. For all she knew, his remains could be lying under the dirt beneath the scrap of that facility.

Still it did leave a lot to wonder in regards to how she wound up in D.C when she had resigned to her fate before she had collapsed from exhaustion.

No. It didn't matter now, he was nowhere in sight and thankfully neither was that creepy doppelganger of his. She wondered what exactly the deal was with that? Did Wesker have a brother he hadn't told anyone about? If he did perhaps even he didn't know. That thought struck her as somewhat ridiculous; that damned man knew everything. Or he thought he did. On a different note, perhaps the man wasn't related to Wesker at all, at least not in the traditional sense, he could be a clone.

No, she shook her head as the elevator opened and she walked slowly down the hall for the plaque that read her room number, he didn't look exactly like Wesker, just similar.

So what? Wesker had some freaky look-a-like roaming around doing the almost exact thing he was doing? What the hell was he? The leader of some creepy Wesker fan club?

That was too weird. She popped the key in the lock and stepped into the modest yet clean and crisp room. Wasting no time she began to strip her clothes and mindlessly trudged into the small bathroom attached to the room. Running the water she'd need for a nice, super hot shower.

As she stepped into the searingly hot water, not a drop of cold water used, it felt as cozy as a normal shower would. The virus had significantly changed her body's reaction to temperature and she could only feel them properly if they were at extreme temperatures, be it scalding hot or below-freezing cold. Even then it was still numbed and she would have to be exposed to it for a long time for it to truly cause her body to register as harm.

She was sure she wouldn't have been out in the snow long without the T-Veronica before she had frozen to that of a human popsicle.

Grabbing the complimentary motel shampoo she began to lather her hair fervently, feeling as if being in that tank for so long had instilled in her a stale and disgusting smell.

And speaking of smells, what in the hell was that?

She sniffed curiously and despite the plain scent of the soap she could significantly smell something that immediately brought a sense of deja vu along with it. Technically it was two scents blended together but her keen nose could seperate them; being an avid motorcycle aficionado she recognized the first.

Leather and the other seemed to be that of a crisp ocean breeze wafting over a smoldering flame.

The introduction of these new scents instilled in her a sense of caution and she hurriedly rinsed her hair and scrubbed herself clean before stepping out of the shower quietly, not bothering to turn off the water just yet in order not to give herself away to whoever was waiting in her room.

And she was sure there was someone out there.

Quietly she slipped a towel across her body, happy that it covered her completely but cursing herself that she hadn't had the foresight to bring her clothes into the bathroom with her. Turning the knob painstakingly slow, she opened the door and stepped out, shutting the lights off immediately, the sound of the shower still muffling any noises she could have made. She peered around the corner and when she found that no one was there she let out a sigh of relief and set towards the bed to retrieve her clothes.

"Evening, dear heart."

She froze when the words slipped through her ears like the satin she was sure they were made of. In that brief moment she wasn't sure whether she should be relieved or surprised that he was in her room with her and not elsewhere or better yet, dead. There was one thing she wasn't however, and that was the thing that sent warning bells off in her head immediately.

She was not afraid of Albert Wesker.

...

_**A/N: Okay, here's the deal. I have already written the next two chapters and am 70 percent done with the fourth. They will all be about this length. Nice and loooong. If you want the next I will post but only after I see some reviews here! Gimme some love! Anyways, as soon as you guys critique I shall post. Thanks!**_


	2. II: Crack

_**A/N: I got my reviews so you guys get another chapter...and the other one too lol. Funny how three chaps of this story are equivalent to the entirety of VD lol. I couldn't wait to post em so...Still you have to review though! LOVE YA GUYS!**_

_**DISCLAIMER: I do not own Resident Evil, or the characters used within. I own only my computer, my OC's, my imagination and a bag of rainbow twizzlers.**_

**Breaking The Glass  
><strong>**  
>Sequel to Vas Domus<strong>

...

**II**

**[Crack]**

...

_Isn't my word enough?  
>What I say is what you get<br>And all I get is you turning away  
><em>  
>...<p>

Turning slowly, her hand clenched around the towel still covering her body, she was met with his barely visible silhouette leaning against the corner opposite the one the bathroom door was behind. How in the hell had she not noticed he was there?

Now she was fighting two different emotions, being obviously aware of her nude state and wanting to scream at him to get out so she could dress and that of wanting to throw herself into his arms and squeezing him tightly.

Had she honestly missed him that much?

She wanted to do something bold - scream, cry, fight or even kiss him - but in the end she did nothing of the sort.

"Would you mind turning around so I can get dressed? I don't need you checking me out." She said, a little shortly and relief flooded her when he let loose that small chuckle she hadn't realized she missed. He said nothing as she trained her glare on him until he turned around to face the wall.

She dressed fast, mostly out of nerves than out of modesty, and then let him know she was done. As he turned back around she set down on the edge of the bed, neither of them making a move to close the distance between them. Finally he spoke after what felt - to her anyway - to be an eternity of strained silence.

"Are you feeling alright?" His voice was softer than before and she furrowed her eyebrows at him.

"As alright as I can feel..." She stopped for a moment as if weighing carefully the situation she was being handed and somehow she felt as if she must be sleeping. It was just...unreal that he was here now, "How did you find me?"

"A little bird told me." She couldn't see it but she knew that a smirk was forming on his face and she was suddenly assaulted with a new realization.

He was - and because of her doing, no less - once again infected.

She wasn't sure whether or not to be concerned, for all she knew he could be here to kill her.

But she doubted this sincerely; if he wanted her dead, he'd have done it already. Or at least he would have tried tried and she wondered if he knew that she was infected as well.

"Would that little bird happen to be named A. Wong?" She asked, before realizing that the words had left her mouth. Somehow...it just fit.

"I see she interfered even though I told her not to," He pushed himself off the wall, his visage becoming visible, "Although I suppose I should be thankful she did. You don't look as if you've just escaped the clutches of an enemy."

Claire was taken aback. Just what else did he know? She felt herself growing more and more irritated with him and as happy as she had been to see him a bit ago, now she was just wishing he'd leave. She had buried him long ago, what right did he have to ruin the closure she had made for herself?

"Why are you here, Wesker?" She snapped, the solid feeling of rejection returning with the memories of that night. He had dismissed her and in the end she had to watch him die. All she could feel right now was a numb sort of anguish that made her nauseous and the burning of her skin which, despite her tolerance to temperature, felt very hot.

Most of all, she was embarrassed.

And he seemed a slight bit taken aback, as if he'd been expecting any other response than that one.

"Does my presence bother you, Claire?" All of her negative feelings faded for a slight moment when she realized that he hadn't called her 'Miss Redfield' but they returned swiftly.

"Honestly yes. I watched you die and now you're standing here as if nothing happened, shooting the shit with me like..." She veered off, unsure of what she was going to say but his voice echoed in her head like a bad dream.

_'I think it would be best if you left.'_

It stung her to core and she had no idea why even now she had hung on to it. The reappearance of him after what was quite some time with no word whatsoever was most likely the catalyst. Silence followed and he crossed his arms across a chest that was covered in a tight vinyl looking battle suit of some sort. He wore a long black leather trench that was open and it blew a bit in the breeze from the cracked window across from them.

"I came to ensure that you would not be harmed, dear heart. After I can safely assume that you are no longer in danger, I will leave you be. Until then I'm afraid we have a plane to catch."

"What?" She hissed, angry at him for thinking that he could come in here like nothing had ever happened and demand that she come with him, "I'm not in any danger. I can take care of myself."

"I have no doubt in that at all, dear heart, however if you are in fact recaptured by the man pursuing you I don't think you'll be able to get away so easily again." He spoke, face hidden by those sunglasses that seemed to be welded on his face. As much as she wanted to kick him in his smug face, and she was sure she'd be able to do some kind of damage, she needed to know what connection the two had to eachother.

"You know him?"

"Unfortunately. The second time around he will have taken preventive measures to make sure you don't escape again. He will not stop until he has what you have."

"You mean the virus. I had a feeling," Claire looked up into those shaded eyes, trying to see a shade of gray amongst all that black. She wanted to determine which of two evils were the lesser but she already knew the answer. She had to ask though, "Did you...did you get me out of that facility...a year ago?"

"Yes." His voice was taut as if he was uncomfortable talking about this. Doing that would admit that he had a moment of human compassion in an instance where he shouldn't. The virus controlled his emotions to a point where anything other than indifference and anger were unacceptable. When he had woken he had taken her to a place where she would be safe, instead of sticking her into a tank with the knowledge that she had infected herself. That's what he _should_ have done, he reasoned, but he simply did not. He didn't know the rhyme or reason of his actions and that bothered him to no extent.

"I see." She already knew the truth but she wanted to hear him admit to it. Perhaps he figured he could at least do her the service of sparing her all of the tests she was sure he had wanted to run on her because she had essentially returned to him to what he was inside.

Inhuman.

It made no sense, she thought, it was like he _enjoyed_ being inhuman and cruel. She had only seen a few instances of this but she had heard the stories. She had watched the contempt and even the fear light in her brother's eyes when he had told her of the evils he had committed. And she was sure there were many, many more even he didn't know about.

"Claire, we have to leave immediately. Your trail was easy to track for me, for him it will be slightly more difficult but not by much." In a shocking display, he grabbed her wrist to pull her from the bed but she remained there, solid. He seemed worried and for some reason unknown to her this pleased her. She could feel her heart beat increase at his closeness and something primal urging through her normal demeanor. Her skin flushed slightly from the searing heat of his hand burning through it's leather cover, still wrapped around her wrist tightly. She knew that because of this stimuli, the virus was flaring up quickly in her blood. In the reflection of his glasses she could see her eyes, before a placid cobalt, ignite to an acidic blue green as the little sparks of gold formed around her pupil. Usually she could contain the change but something about being near him made her more unstable and it was harder to control it. It was like two sides of the same coin, like some kind of insane schizophrenic meltdown or an alter ego. Call it what you will but one thing it wasn't was good. Like Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde, Claire had slipped into one of her rare instances where the virus would take her over almost completely, no physical mutation to speak of save for her eyes, but her demeanor would change. She could still control what she did but it was like a switch flipped in her brain, turning everything light into dark, right into wrong and safe into dangerous. She _could _stop herself but...

She didn't want to.

"Are you afraid of him?" She laughed boldly and in a voice that was barely her own. His eyes narrowed to that of slits and she reached her hand up to remove those offensive shades, quite pleased but still disappointed that he didn't stop her. Those turbulent fire hued orbs burned fiercely into hers and the corner of her lip moved upwards into a mocking smirk as she crushed the shades easily with one hand. Wesker was seething at the fact that she had challenged his fearlessness and though she was sure this wouldn't end well a sick craving had surfaced inside of her. The _fucking_ power rush she knew was about to come made every cell in her body supercharged. Every hair on the back of her neck stood on end under the intensity of his gaze. She knew she could handle him and perhaps he knew as well, which was why he hadn't tried to hurt her yet. Still, she wanted him to hurt her, as sick as it sounded. She wanted to feel _alive._

"Oh, Wesker you're so predictable," She leaned in close to whisper in his ear, "Look at you, all tense and angry. Trying to act like some hardened bastard with no feelings. You fear just as anyone else!" She spat and tilted her red head back in a loud, merciless laugh revealing to him her neck, daring him to grasp it and try, _just fucking try, _to hurt her. Her change was fueled by her anger towards him from the past and the desire for him that lingered in her body even still.

In seconds she was pinned against the wall, a hand that could rip reinforced steel like paper the only thing keeping her in place. She could hear his pulse quicken, although only slightly, and his scent grew stronger causing a flutter in her lower abdomen.

"Don't test me, Redfield," He hissed eliciting something between a moan and a laugh from the woman he was holding up even though she was struggling for air, "Don't make the mistake of being so imprudent to assume that you know _anything. _You. Know. Nothing." Every word was punctuated with a tight squeeze to her throat and despite the pain of struggling to breathe she was relishing in the fact that she could make him lose his composure. She raised her leg up to kick him off of her but he grabbed her knee at the very last moment, pushing his body into hers to prevent movement. His hard body pinned her and she could feel the heat inside of her raise just a fraction, his lips curling into a smirk that matched her own as his eyes traveled down her neck, the very action making her shudder. He removed his grip from her throat and braced himself against the wall with that very hand.

"You can't play this game with me, dear heart," He leaned forward, his nose brushing her throat and in a very strange motion blew on the already healing bruises, the heat of his breath sending brutal shivers down her spine, "I'll always win." Vermilion serpentine eyes mocked her attempts to incite anger in him. Claire shifted against him, moving her knee just slightly brushing her leg against the apex of his thighs and he thrust her back into the wall hard with an animalistic snarl. Then suddenly, the heat of his body was gone and she dropped to the floor with a thud. He crossed the room in seconds leaving a slightly confused and cobalt blue eyed girl on the floor. She opened her mouth to try to explain that she didn't know what had happened but he cut her off suddenly.

"Your virus reacts strangely to my own, dear heart. It's not unusual, but you should try and be more careful next time. I'd dislike to have to kill you." His voice was cold and emotionless once again and the entire surreality of what just happened prevented her from standing at first. Finally she got to her feet, avoiding looking at his face.

"We should go." He said, removing a second pair of sunglasses from his coat and slid them on his face.

He walked toward the window, coat billowing behind him. Still on the floor, she made no motion to move until he turned his head to look at her, leaving faint trails of red behind the shades.

Slowly she stood, still irritated with him and unnerved by the little incident that just occurred. She pushed past him, refusing to show him anymore weakness, and climbed on the windowsill, preparing to jump off yet another building. The sky was beginning to lighten from a deep shade of violet to a lighter purple and the crest of the sun was barely peeking over the white horizon. It was beautiful and Claire wish she'd had the time to gaze at for longer but instead she spread her arms out with grace and jumped. Seconds later he followed and somehow hit the ground before she did. Maybe because he was heavier? That _could_ be it, she reasoned, but she had a feeling that ever since their little spat he felt the need to outdo her in everything.

Bastard could even fall faster than she could.

He started off in front of her, leading the way and she followed, pulling the hood up on her sweatshirt as they dispersed onto an empty street. Moments passed in silence as they walked until she felt she had to open her mouth to say anything.

"Where are we going?" The freezing air nearly freezing the inside of her mouth and she regretted opening it instantly. She prayed they were going somewhere warmer.

"Alaska." He said, walking significantly faster once they got closer to where they were going.

Well, damn. Alaska wouldn't be much warmer at all. She exhaled a sigh that he didn't pay attention to and soon they had stopped at a corner where an awfully familiar looking black Mercedes was sitting, a thin layer of snow coating it's windshield and top. It wasn't the same one as before, she noted, this one was slightly newer and seemed impossibly more black. He must have pressed a button behind her because the car beeped as the doors unlocked.

"Do you have one of these in every country or something?" She huffed as he pulled open the driver door, motioning for her to get in. With an exaggerated eye roll she followed his lead, clicking her seatbelt in place and immediately searched for the knob for the heat, turning it up to the highest setting when he started the car.

They didn't speak for the entire ride to the secluded private airstrip and Claire just leaned her head against the door, letting the smooth motion lull her to sleep. It had been so long since she had slept and while she was in that stupid tank for who knew how long, when she got out she felt utterly exhausted from the get go.

Being drugged down like an animal was not as sufficient as actual sleep was. What felt like two minutes of wonderful slumber had passed when she was being shaken by a large hand on her shoulder.

"We're here already?" She yawned, wiping sleep out of her eyes groggily.

"Dear heart, you were asleep for nearly three hours." He smirked and fluidly - like everything else he did - stepped out of the car. Less than gracefully she got out as well, following him towards a decent sized private jet not too far from their parking place. As they approached the hatch fell open and a set of steps flowed out. Much like a gentleman he went first and offered her his hand. Unknown as to why she would when she knew she could handle steps herself, she took it and entered the rather luxurious plane.

"Wow," She whispered, taking in the interior that could easily outdo that of any first class section on a normal plane, "I didn't know you had this."

"I have a few actually. This is one of my smaller models." He said, taking a seat near the middle of the plane before removing his laptop from a compartment that she couldn't see from her position.

"Business is treating you well then? You know, Wesker, money can't buy happiness."

"Dear heart-"

"I'm just saying, you could have enough money to buy all of the islands in the south seas, which I'm sure you do but-"

"Dear heart you should-"

"you'll still be just as unhappy as-OOMPH!" As the plane ascended into the air, due to turbulence, Claire lost her footing and pitched sideways, tumbling over ungracefully across the seat closest to her. The chuckle that came behind her made her face burn red and haughtily she straightened up and buckled the belt, silently refusing to allow him the pleasure of seeing her embarrassed.

"Everything alright up there?" He asked, still obviously quite amused. Which she didn't appreciate, thank you very much.

"Just wonderful..." She muttered in response. It wasn't meant to be towards him _and _it was supposed to be sarcastic but...

"Glad to hear it." He responded in an annoying chirpy sort of nature that she was sure he was using for the sole purpose of ruffling her feathers and she let out a noise of frustration. She literally wanted to rip her hair out and stuff it down his throat, because _that _wasn't creepy at all. Honestly, she could give a crap less right now, she'd put live scorpions in his underwear to get him to go away if she knew he wouldn't just kill the poor things and then try and kill her.

See? See how horrible he was? So much so that she was feeling sorry for scorpions right now and she hated scorpions.

Suddenly she was affronted with a surge of emotion. How could he do this? How could he just act like nothing had ever happened at all? He went on about this sort of thing as if they had never spent half a year together and she was just another sample for him to watch over and toy with.

_'Because you are, aren't you?'_

The voice in her head - hooray for insanity - was making a compelling yet unsettling point. Maybe he really did feel that way and that was something that absurdly bothered her to no end. And also, why the hell did she even care how he thought of her? He's evil, inhumane and deceitful to a fault! In fact, she should really be trying to avoid him at all costs during this. Yes, she mused, that's exactly what she would do. Ignore the crap out of him until he could finally scoot out of her life for good.

As if by some unseen force she turned her head slightly, bottom half of her face covered by the tall seat, and was met by the sight of his head peering down at his laptop.

Damn it, Claire! Don't look at him you idiot! Just ignore him and maybe he'll go away.

In a childish moment she shut her eyes close tightly and tried to will him gone but his voice ruined her magical wish completely.

"Look out of the window, dear heart." There it was, she seethed, that stupid smirk that made her want to tear his lips off. She didn't even have to see it to know it was there. Even though she didn't want to obey and look out of the window like he said to, something told her that she'd be missing out if she didn't.

A wistful 'Oh' left her mouth as she was met with the enthralling sight of half a dozen dolphins leaping over the ocean's surface in a beautiful motion. She watched them for a while, a small smile she couldn't help on her face, admiring the fluid movements as they slid over one another and dove under the water sleekly barely causing any disruption in the water. A part of her wished that she do that, swim with a dolphin that was. They were such beautiful creatures and for the most part very docile and friendly; it had been a dream of hers as a child. Ever since her parents had brought she and Chris to Sea World for her sixth birthday she had been quite enamored with dolphins and sea life in general. She had pondered taking up Marine Biology as her college major but for some reason chose Literature instead, finding it to be a more suitable path for her to follow. She enjoyed the study of the written arts but it wasn't something she was in love with; she always had a feeling that marine biology would have been.

Her enthrallment with the gentle sea creatures below was halted when she felt the burning of his eyes on the side of her head. Against all reason she turned to meet his gaze, shadeless and crimson in the low light of the plane cabin, and found herself more entranced than she had been with the dolphins.

Neither moved away but merely sat there, looking at eachother; she with a morbid fascination and he with...something she couldn't identify. He narrowed his eyes slightly and his mouth pinched together tightly and it looked as if he wanted to say something but just could not. Under his intense scrutiny she found her heartbeat quicken and rattle her body, her breathing becoming just a bit more shallow the longer he held the gaze. There was something behind those eyes, something that she knew he'd never say but what she was hoping he was at least feeling. All she wanted from him was to recognize that while maybe not now, there had been a time when he had considered her at least somewhat important to him. At the very least she had hoped he had considered her a friend, or what his equivalent of a friend was.

It wasn't as if she wanted him to love her.

No, she never wanted that. While she had thought for awhile that she might have fallen for him she quickly decided after that night that she could _never_ love him. It was all an effect of prolonged loneliness and him being the only one she was around for so long. Loving Albert Wesker was as smart as repeatedly slamming a car door on your head. It would only end in a terrible mess that no matter how hard someone tried could never get completely clean. It would be like trying to scrub a sidewalk of blood with toilet paper.

So no, she didn't love him, she told herself, it was the most logical choice of action. Could she be physically attracted to him? Of course, who wouldn't? Mentally stimulated? Sure. But love him? No, that was something she would never do. Loving someone who simply could not love was not something she could ever do.

Her heart had been through enough pain and tragedy to even ponder that one.

Still, as his ember eyes singed into hers, she couldn't help but feel that if life hadn't taken the course it had, if he had stayed human and they had gotten more time together that maybe things would have been different. Vying for the attention of a man who gave none would only get her hurt in the end.

The only thing she could do was keep her space and hope that this would end better than it did last time.

That was the one thing she could bank on; one way or another, this would end.

...

A veil of red whipped around like liquid silk from behind a brick corner as a small trail of smoke drifted away to be washed in with the cold, bitter wind. Tightening her jacket across her body she kicked away an empty glass bottle with one seemingly delicate heeled foot, the corner of her ruby painted lips upturning as it shattered against the wall. Inhaling artfully she flicked the end of her cigarette leaving a small pile of ashes blending in with the glass and she sighed.

He hadn't responded back or tried to contact her since she alerted him of Claire Redfield's location several days ago but she knew not to be concerned. Instead she was intrigued. Finding out about the seemingly small connection he had to his dead rival's sister had piqued her more than anything she had ever come across in her career but it wasn't something she had pursued. She had merely stored the information away in her mental file of 'Just In Case' and went on about trying to ignore the fact that he was still alive. She hadn't returned that last night years ago before he began his run with Uroboros and she had never regretted it. She didn't hate him, she just knew that it was better to have him not in her life period than it was to have him in it, even if he was human.

Now that had been something that had truly floored her, not that he had lost to his overambition but that he was still even alive. She really didn't think that he would have survived, as the file she stole from the B.S.A.A put it, 'contact with two rocket propelled grenades in the mouth of active volcano'. He was ridiculously resilient of course but the serum overdose he had endured following the unstable strain of willingly infecting himself with Uroboros was just something she hadn't seen him dodging.

The man was truly a master at cheating death and now he was even infected again.

She rose a perfectly arched eyebrow and stomped her burnt to the nub cigarette into the ground before walking away from the corner. The cold weather in this country was something she'd never get used to and she couldn't wait to get somewhere warmer. Maybe she'd treat herself to a nice vacation in the Bahamas or the Carribbeans.

Or maybe she'd pay a long overdue visit to the ever handsome Mr. Kennedy.

As much as she hated to admit this, not being a woman who liked to show things of this matter, but she couldn't help herself when her mind would constantly turn to thoughts of him. He had, after all, proven himself worthy of her attentions more than once.

Yes, she smiled just slightly, a night away with him might just be what the doctor ordered. Just one night, just to see if he was as alluring as he appeared to be.

Unfortunately, the cold steel on the back of her neck and the click of a barrel had other plans for her and she froze, beautiful face still displaying that slight smirk. They had cocked that barrel far to early. Amateurs.

"Can I help you?" She said to the dark, voice as smooth as chocolate. The male voice behind her just laughed although without humor. Such a striking familiarity, she thought, amused at this.

"The infamous Ada Wong, I presume. Such a rarity to catch you on solid ground." His voice didn't sound like Wesker's but it definitely had that cocky and pompous tone to it. It came out much better when Wesker did it though.

"I'm afraid we haven't met. Mister...?" She was only doing this to annoy him and it seemed as if it worked. Poor baby brother was probably just a shadow in his older brother's footsteps, probably always had been. Feigning ignorance to his being would further serve to unsettle him, something she knew she could do with this particular Wesker. He most likely couldn't snap her neck without breaking a sweat like the elder Wesker.

"Oh Ms. Wong, I'm afraid you already know who I am," He began, his voice coming closer to her, slightly raspy in her ear and strikingly hot in contrast to the freezing cold, "What I don't understand, and I was hoping you could clarify this for me, is why you insist on helping a man who - up until recently - basically kept you like a dog on a long leash. Why is that Ms. Wong?" His fingertips glided up her neck and caught her chin, slipping her head back and she caught a pair of toxic green eyes briefly before she snapped her head forward.

"I don't know what you're talking about." She said, feigning innocence but inside her chest was burning. Of course she knew, but hearing it aloud made her skin tingle fiercely. She was beginning to think that she underestimated this guy just a bit.

"We're both adults, _Ada._" He said her name as if it were an exotic fruit he wanted to taste but all it did was serve to creep her out even more. The gun was pushing hard in the back of her head and his hand was still on her neck, his chest was pressed against her back, "There's no need for childish games. Walk." He pushed on her head hard and she cursed her luck at not having any viable loaded weapon. It seemed she would just have to make due with what she had.

Seduction could sometimes be a greater weapon than a gun.

She spun around, watching his confused eyes with pleasure and pressed her front against him. He stiffened, and pressed the gun into her shoulder as she leaned forward and spoke in his ear, "Really? I was kind of hoping we could just _talk _right here." Her voice was that of silk in his ear and she knew without a shadow of a doubt that he was affected.

Or so she thought, until he laughed in her ear.

"Of course Ms. Wong," In a split second she heard a small click that may have been deafening loud as the trigger pulled and she was knocked back onto the ground, blood leaking out of her shoulder and pain searing up her neck and towards her back, "Whatever you want." Her vision was blurring more and more with every second and just before she lost conciousness, she looked up to acid green eyes and a devilish smile.

_Sorry Leon, I guess our date will have to wait..._

...

"Sir, Wong is stable but she's still won't talk."

"Put her in cell 2 and make sure she's been checked and stripped. We don't need anymore _problems_ do we, Gleeson?"

"No sir. Of course not."

"I'll see to our guest shortly. Dismissed."

John Gleeson left the elaborate office space in a flash, not wanting to be around the Chairman anymore than necessary. It was safe to say that while strong and beyond useful in a skirmish, he wasn't exactly the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree. Be that as it may though even he knew not to spend too much time in the room with Alex Wesker if he had a reason to not want you there.

Still...he was kind of stupid.

And it was with this knowledge, even having just learned it minutes before, that Ada Wong decided that when he came around to move her, she would get out of here.

When he entered the keypad locked medical room, she was sitting on the bed, one smooth leg crossing the other and slipped her dress down so he could see what she had on display.

"I've been given orders to move...you..." He caught sight of her and his words slowed, not catching the pleased look in her eyes when they narrowed on the syringe in his hand. Obviously it was meant to sedate her if she put up a struggle. She smiled, putting on her best 'damsel in distress face' and lowered her eyes seductively.

"Oh, thank goodness you came back. It's so scary in here," She leaned forward and saw him visibly gulp, "_all alone._"

He didn't say anything as he closed in on her, obviously from lack of words and Ada let slip a crocodile tear for her benefit.

"Please...don't leave me again. I need someone big and strong to protect me." She took his hand softly and looked up into his eyes. Inwardly she was feeling just a bit sorry for this big brute, knowing that when she did get out his boss was not going to be happy about it. He'll probably get fired for this, or get killed.

Still, as she threw herself at him in a display of faux weakness, she knew it wasn't her problem. Her problem lie in getting out of this place, and she would without a doubt. He wrapped his arms around her and rubbed her back.

"Hey...It's okay. Don't cry." She smiled into his chest. This man was far too easy. Poor sap.

"You'll protect me?" She looked up at him and he smiled proudly. Seriously, she thought, he must be slow or something. Poor, poor sap. Once she had his gaze he didn't even notice as she slipped the syringe from his hand before it was too late and he was on the floor, unconscious.

"Sorry buddy, no hard feelings." She said as she grabbed his pistol and knife and with luck, found a grapple gun on him as well. Good, she didn't have to use the hallway. Doing so would have put a possible shorten on her life expectancy and she didn't feel much like dying today. It was bad enough that she'd let Alex catch her off guard once, she certainly could not let him catch her again.

She used the knife to pry open the window locks and pushed it open. If she timed her jump right she could grapple over to the building close to this one and climb downward with little effort.

However, as she placed her foot on the windowsill to leap down, the wailing siren of an intruder alert sounded off throughout the building, stopping her in her tracks.

...

Finally, Leon breathed a sigh of relief as the large facility set in a vast expanse of snow came into view, maybe now they could get Claire back.

Due to Jill's excellent research skills they were able to determine that a large company named VitaLife was headquartered out of Russia and that according to various contact calls, it had bought out the remains of Umbrella about four years ago. Right now it was the only lead that they had and they hadn't hesitated to jump it if it meant that they could be on the right track. Jill had tried to find the identity of the head of the company but that search came up cold, a warning sign that something dirty was going on in this corporation.

"Put us down about a mile from the outside of the perimeter. When we're done we'll call for evac." Jill called out over the beat of the helicopter blades and a friendly bearded face looked back at her.

"You sure you don't want me to come with you? You might need the extra man power. If these people bought out Umbrella there's no telling what might be in there."

"No, we'll be fine. We need you to pull our asses out of here if things get hot." She checked her double pistols to ensure they were loaded and then her side pack for ammo. Leon did the same with his Beretta and SMG.

"Alright. Be careful Jill. You too, Leon. You're no help to Claire dead." He said to the two as they lowered the rope ladder and climbed over the edge.

"You know it. Thanks Barry, we couldn't have done this without you." Jill flashed him a small smile before dropping down into the snow below, Leon nodding to Barry and following right behind her.

Once on ground Jill pulled a pair of binoculars from her belt and clicked on the night vision.

"See anything?" Leon asked, raising the hood on his coat.

"No. There aren't any guards on the outside of the building, no lights on that I can see. That fence does look very high though. How are we going to get over that thing?"

"Why get over when you can get through?" Leon smirked, as Jill looked at him in a brief second of confusion before she caught sight of the small pair of wirecutters in his hand.

"I knew there was a reason I liked you, Kennedy." She peered back into her binoculars, checking out the entrance to the facility, "Shit, that gates electrified. So now what?"

"I guess we just have to turn off the power to it. C'mon, lets just hope the control panel is outside of the facility." They took off slowly in the direction of the building.

"Okay but how are we going to get to it? It's probably on the other side of the fence."

"Shoot it?" Leon asked, uncertainly but Jill's face lit up.

"You think this will work?" She pulled out a high powered taser from her belt and handed it to him.

"Yeah, we can overload the circuit and it should blow it out. _If _the voltage is high enough."

"And if that doesn't work?"

"Guess we'll just have to-" He stopped shortly.

"What?" Jill asked, coming to rest beside him, confusion and worry etched on her features.

"You don't see it?" Leon's voice dropped to a whisper and he backed up slowly just a few inches.

"See what? I can't see anything, not through all this snow."

"Right there, next to the gate." Leon pointed and as she followed his finger Jill let out a silent gasp before pulling her binoculars to her eyes to look.

"Oh god, what _is_ that thing?" She placed her hand on her gun and pulled it out, leaving it to rest at her side. Out amidst the snow covered ground was a large black splotched creature with sallowy yellow skin, about five feet tall, it's mouth open and ripping what appeared to be a wolf's legs off. It was sick looking, vaguely resembling a hunter but much wider and had a large set of claws on it's right arm. As they moved forward slowly they noticed that it was oozing out some sort of mucus from little holes in the center of it's black splotches. As it fell off the creature it melted the snow instantly, leaving unnaturally large puddles for such little substance

"That's gross." Leon followed suit, "What is that junk?"

"Looks like...an acid or something. Or maybe it's just really hot?" Jill said quietly, not wanting at all to go toe to toe with that thing but if life taught us anything it's that if it happened once, it will most likely happen again. Good thing they had been expecting a biohazard. Of course everytime they leave the house they half-expect some vile experiment to jump out at them from behind a grocery shelf. Old habits died hard.

"I do not want to touch that."

"I guess we were right about this not being a normal pharmaceutical industry. How do you think it got out?"

"Not a clue, but if there are more out here we could be in trouble. And if it manages to get into town-" He trailed off not needing to say what came next since she already knew.  
>"Maybe we can find where it left the perimeter and get in that way. It certainly looks big enough."<p>

"Yeah well, that's a good plan but let's try not to alarm it okay? I really don't want to end up like that wolf." Jill said, obviously still grossed out. And she had seen a many thing that was truly disgusting but this was among the top five. It looked positively joyous to be dismembering that animal too, making little sounds that resembled laughter mixed with a screech. That was even more sickening than the creature itself.

"Agreed. Let's go around."

With no time to waste they set off towards the back of the building and while praying to whoever that they wouldn't encounter another one of those things both knew that they would do whatever they had to in order to get to Claire.

...

Claire shifted around anxiously, restless and eager to do anything other than sit there for who knew how much longer. Considering she had been sitting on this examination table for at least two hours she didn't feel as if she'd be leaving anytime soon. It wasn't as if the small, plain room she had been put in was much better. The bed was comfortable but it was small, just big enough to not fall off of and the carpet was soft and plush but it was the ugliest shade of green she had ever seen. This place must have been built way back in the day and no one had the decency to remodel. She was willing to bet that Wesker's room was much more top notch. All in all she found that there had to be over three dozen people in this facility at one time but she never seen many more than that and from the way they came and went showed that they probably didn't live here like she did. She didn't blame them, this place was the pits. Not to mention no one ever seemed to turn on the heat around here. It was constantly cold all the damn time and she knew it had to be extremely cold in order to affect her.

"Are you almost done?" She huffed, irritated, at the man who had his back turned to her. She was overcome with the need to put a 'Kick Me' sign on that back, and stifled a fit of giggles.

"Patience is a virtue, dear heart." He said through quick scrawls on a stack of papers.

"Oh, I forgot. You know all about things that are morally good." She rolled her eyes at him when he didn't respond, "What are you doing anyway?"

"Writing."

"...Seriously?" She whined, clearly aware of her childish nature but she couldn't help it. She had been at this stupid facility, with it's overly white halls and floors and too bright fluorescents for almost four days now and she had done nothing but let him poke and prod at her. There wasn't even a TV in this god forsaken hell hole and who knew what kind of freaky things were taking naps under her feet. Maybe she should steal his laptop, then at least she could send Leon an email letting him know she was okay.

Oh yes because she and Wesker were such good buddies like that and he _wouldn't _kill her for it. No, not at all.

She sighed as she realized that a part of her missed Wesker's house in the Rockies. At least there was a TV, not that she had used it much, considering there were other things to do there.

'UNLIKE HERE!'

Then she was hit with an idea that might even make the almighty Wesker back down and let her leave, "Umm...Wesker?" He didn't respond for a moment but when he did his tone was unnervingly patronizing, like he was talking to a child.

"Yes, Claire?"

"I have...cramps," She said, just a bit embarrassed,"I need to go to the bathroom."

"What kind of cramps, dear heart?" He said, amused. She rolled her eyes exaggeratedly.

"You know...period cramps." Oh Jesus, Claire he's a doctor don't act like such a child.

A moment passed and she could have sworn she heard him sniff at something, "I don't smell anything."

If there was an award for being the absolutely most mortified person in the world, she was sure she'd have gotten it in that moment, "What!" She almost screamed but it came out in a rough whisper, "You can smell..._that?_"

"Yes dear heart. And yours is quite prominent so I'm sure I would know if you were menstruating."

"WHAT?" Well this time she did scream. So much for being adult about this Claire, good job. Still, how in the hell would he know how _prominent_ her period smelled? The only time she had ever been around him when she was on her period was when he was still human. Unless-

Oh, Jesus, unless it's just _that_ strong.

Claire felt the need to disappear completely but unfortunately as much as she tried, she couldn't. Why was it that everytime she was around him she felt much like a teenager again? Stupid patronizing dick.

"Don't overreact, every woman menstruates. You shouldn't lie to me, dear heart, you should know better by now."

Previous mortification gone, she was once more assaulted with the desire to kick him where the sun didn't shine but she just hung her head a bit, paying very close attention to the perfectly white tile, intent on finding any imperfection in it that she could.

Not unexpectedly, there were none. No cracks, no scuffs, not even so much as one speck of dirt to speak of. For some reason this made her angry but she had no idea why. She lifted her eyes to the broad back in front of her and realized that she wasn't angry at the floor. She was angry at him. The floor was just a metaphor and the man before her was just like it.

Impeccable, always together, never dirty and never wrong. It just bothered her that he had no cracks, no weaknesses, no apparent imperfections. If he did have any flaws he didn't see them and the things someone normal might view as flaws - god complex, _insanity_ being just two of several - he found them all well placed. He didn't see himself as any of those things. To Wesker, he was a god, he was perfectly sane, and he was above any other being completely.

And sometimes, Claire was worried that he may be right.

Now who was insane?

In all aspects of socially acceptable perfection Wesker was without a doubt perfect; perfect mind, perfect body. To society that was what made someone perfect, to Claire he lacked something even more important than those two.

Possibly a soul or if not that, then all moral concience to speak of. It wasn't as if she was judgemental and she certainly was no patron saint but at least she tried to the right thing. He went out of his way to do everything immoral as he could.

_'Everything, Claire?'_

'Yes, voice in my head, everything.'

Oh god, now she was talking back to it. She hung her head even lower and placed her hands on her face, wishing that she had something - possibly a pillow or something more blonde - to punch and scream at.

"Is something wrong, dear heart? You seem troubled." Why did he do that? If he didn't care, which she knew he didn't, then why act concerned? Was he just that cruel? Did he just hate her that much? Unable to stifle her feelings anymore she opened her mouth and was unable to stop it once it started.

"Oh fuck you. What do you care anyway? Oh that's right, you _don't_ care, you just like to pretend that you do because it's a jolly good fucking time for you to insult me and patronize me every single second I've been here. You're nothing but a sadist and a bastard and don't expect me to trust anything you say or do. So fuck you, fuck your attitude, fuck your god complex," She leapt off the table and grabbed the closest thing she could throw - a box of tissue - and tossed it at his head which he dodged like a bug with a tilt of his head, "And fuck your stupid perfect floor!" She stomped down at it, channeling all of her virally enhanced power and managing to crack the previously perfect tile.

That felt so much better.

She had thought he would have stopped her, thrown her to the wall and choked her out or beat her half to death but he just stood there, as unreadable as always.

"Are you finished?" He asked, and she was pleased that he seemed to be holding back some anger and his face seemed more tight than normal.

"No, I'm not finished you dick! I'm never going to be finished. I thought I was finished with you, finished with Umbrella, finished with all of this fucking bullshit! I'm sick and tired of being chased down all of the fucking time! Do you have any idea what's it like to have to watch your back every second of your goddamn life because there's always some asshole out to get you, or because you're afraid a zombie is gonna jump on your back and eat you! And what the fuck for? Because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time? No! It's because of _you_. You ruined my life, you son of a-" Her words left her mouth as she felt herself flung against the wall behind her. Her hip bumped the table hard and she hissed at the pain briefly before registering that his body was wedging her between himself and the wall. Eyes narrowed she looked up at him angrily and his sunglasses had flown off revealing burning red orbs that showed nothing but pure fury, "Get off of me!" She tried wiggling loose but he the tight grip he had on her shoulders kept her held fast.

"How dare you speak to me that way," He punctuated the sentence by shoving her further into the wall, leaving a Claire shaped dent in the plaster and she let out a little yelp. His hand caught her jaw and squeezed tightly, "You may have the power of the T-Veronica virus but you will NEVER be anywhere near my caliber. I have tried to be patient with you, dear heart, but you have pushed my patience to the breaking point and if you insist on acting as if I treat you so badly then perhaps it's time for you to see exactly how terrible you can have it."

"Go to hell." She spat at him, before successfully sending her knee into his crotch. It caught him off guard momentarily but before she could deliver another blow, this time to his face, he tightened his hold on her, even harder this time. She winced as it felt like his fingers had punctured her flesh and were digging into pure muscle; she was sure it wasn't but it certainly felt that way.

With a snarl he reached up and grabbed a fistful of her hair, dragging her out of the room as she clawed up his arm leaving deep gashes and blood leaking down it and into her hair. While he seemed unfazed by the pain the slickness of his blood allowed her to wiggle out of his grasp and she scrambled to the floor, face covered in the warm coppery fluid.

She wasn't even concerned that some of it had gotten in her eyes and mouth as she lunged at him, her speed increasing and he was almost knocked off balance. At the last moment he dodged so fast it almost looked like he had teleported. Her eyes darkened in confusion and she didn't see him coming at her from the side, arm cocked in a punch that could bash a skull completely. She barely made it as she rolled to the opposite side and he staggered, clearly off guard at the speed he had been moving. She screamed as she lunged forward again, this time catching him as they both flew twenty feet back into the wall in the hallway. A vicious rush of adrenaline seemed to pass between them and when they hit the ground she climbed over him and threw her fist into his face, connecting with his nose.

She prayed it was broken. Unfortunately he recovered like it hadn't happened at all and flipped her over so he was on top of her, the position would have been quite questionable had this been any other time.

And suddenly it ceased, the fighting, the screaming had all just stopped and a two minute staring contest ensued. It seemed neither of them were apt to back down but the way he had her pinned ensured that she wouldn't be going anywhere unless he moved. Like he said, as much as she loathe to admit it, he was still more experienced and by far stronger. She could keep up of course but only for so long. Still she was pretty impressed that she had managed to get a few hits in. The hallway lingered in a creepy silence, the only sound between them was the increased breathing and heart rates they shared.

"Let me go, Wesker." She hissed, voice raspy and tired; honestly she was surprised that the virus hadn't gained control, if it had this fight would still be ongoing.

"Just like a Redfield, your idiocy outweighs your common sense. What is it that you want from me? Without me, you'd have been used up and dead by now, your body lying in a landfill devoted to nothing but failed experiments. I go out of my way to help you and you attack me. Ungrateful." He snarled, his mouth very close to her own and she squirmed against him in a way that made his body tighten stiffly.

"Ha! The only reason you came for me was because you didn't want to lose the virus, it had nothing to do with me." Unnervingly she held his stare, even though the way his eyes narrowed again made her want to crawl into a hole. He was off her in a second, leaving her on the floor, blood painting the floors and walls around them.

"If that's what you believe then you are more ignorant than I thought. Clean yourself up." He started down the hall in the opposite direction and soon he was gone, disappearing behind a sliding metal door and out of view. That last statement did less to fuel her anger and more to fizzle it instead. She had to fight every urge in her body to cry, unsure of why she even cared why he did what he did.

Why did he do it the first time?

She didn't know and she would pretend not to care. He would say and do just about anything to get her on his side and she told herself that she was in this for her own preservation, it didn't matter what he did.

She got to her shaky feet, body trembling more from anxiety than anger or pain. Right now she just wanted to take a nice hot bath and take a nap.

She made her way back to her room and it's unexuberant decorum intent on hitting the tub but once the door closed she was attacked with an exhaustion that she hadn't felt since after leaving Rockfort. Still sticky with his blood she fell on to the bed, not caring much about staining the sheets. She thought about nothing as her eyes closed, mind blank from tiredness.

"I...shouldn't be...this...tire-" Before she could finish her sentence she was dead asleep, completely unaware of the world beyond those sturdy metal walls.

...

The sound of gunfire echoed through the halls as yet another member of the undead variety was effectively snuffed out, rotten body falling to the floor with a sick thud. When Leon and Jill managed to sneak into the hole the unknown creature had dug out of, they hadn't expected the contamination to be this bad. Nearly every single employee had been infected it seemed and if they were counting they would have to say that that was number fifty-six.

That's not counting the various other disgusting B.O.W's they had encountered. The hunters, the lickers, and the two infected dogs had been unsurprising but not unexpected. Still they pushed onward, fueled by the need to locate their friend who seemed to be nowhere around.

Jill pushed a heavy metal door open and entered the room while Leon stood outside to serve as guard for anything that might try to come after them.

"There's a computer in here." She called, voice echoing through an unsettling silence which always served as a siren for something bad waiting close by.

"Can you access it?" He peered down the hall before calling back to her. The coast seemed to be clear so he allowed himself a moment to reload his weapon and readjust his vest.

"Yeah someone left it unlocked, must have been in a hurry," He could hear the sounds of clicking from the keyboard for a moment before she spoke again, this time her voice was full of something undiscernable. It didn't sound good though, "Oh god Leon, come here. You have to see this."

Although not particularly ecstatic about leaving the doorway unmanned he followed after her, knowing that it had to be something important. He stepped through the threshold, stepping over several broken glass shards on the ground and the dark sheen of blood drops covering the floor. Jill was bent over the desk with a look on her face that almost frightened him. The computer screen was bright in his vision and filled with several notes and a photo of Claire that looked very recent.

"I guess Claire is here then." His voice dropped to an almost whisper and Jill turned to look at him, her face in a grim expression as she pointed to a particular paragraph in the notes.

"So it says but that's not the problem. Read there."

"'Subject #002933 - Redfield, Claire N - currently placed in bio-preservation life support tank 018 at 6:13 P.M. No sign of abnormal brain wave activity. Infection level high, though not dangerous, requires further observation. If any unusual activity is recorded place subject under level 7 supervision-'" Leon read quietly, his stomach churning as his expression fell to match that of his partner, "Infection level? Claire's infected? When the hell did that happen?"

"I-I don't know, it doesn't say here," Jill muttered, clicking on a little tab that brought up the schematics for the lab that showed the location of tank 018, "018 is in this room." They both turned to look at the shattered glass and the abandoned tank that stood against the wall. Jill let out a small sound of upset and Leon exhaled a growl before slamming his fist into the desk.

"Shit! Where the hell is she? You think she escaped?" He hissed, walking over to examine the blood stains. They could have very well been hers and that was a thought that made him feel more nauseous than any rotten flesh of any zombie. And infected? It certainly couldn't have happened too long ago, he figured, they had been living together for a while now and she sure as hell didn't show any signs of infection. Or at least none that he could see but maybe he hadn't paid enough attention to actually _see._

No he was sure there hadn't been anything.

"Seems to be that way," Jill sighed, "Leon, what about that six months she couldn't account for? Do you think she may have come into contact with something then? Maybe that's why they came after her in the first place."

"I don't know, all I know is that I heard a knock that morning and there she was, asleep on my doorstep. When she woke up I asked her what happened and she said she didn't know but..."

"But?" Jill urged as they exited the room and searched for more clues as to where she could be. Perhaps she had fled and gone to the town a few miles from here, that was where they would check next for sure.

"But...something about the way she dodged the question, it wasn't right. It was like she was holding something back from me. I kept bringing it up but everytime it was 'I don't know' with some weird look in her eye." Leon sighed, clearly bothered by the entire weight of the situation.

"Maybe she lied, maybe to keep something bad from you. She always seemed normal when I saw her but...I don't know... I should have been there for her..." He could hear the pain in her voice and the sheer guilt she must have felt. He placed a comforting hand on her shoulder, trying to affirm that it wasn't her fault. Claire had spiraled into a hole that no one could bring her out of and then suddenly she was just gone. It was no one's fault, not even Claire's.

"Jill, nothing you did would have-" The sound of gunfire further up the hall made the two freeze in their tracks, and Leon narrowed his eyes. Before they could move or speak a strange clicking noise on the ground began to come closer to them. Out of the darkness of the shadow stepped what appeared to be a ghost from the past, a ghost dressed quite too formally to be handling a pair of dual handguns like they were handbags. A ghost with exotic brown eyes and dark hair and a ceremonious red dress.

"Hello, handsome. Didn't expect to see you skulking around here," A voice as smooth as chocolate drizzled silk flowed forth from slightly upturned, red painted lips, "In the neighborhood?"

"Ada?" It came out sounding like a question but there was no mistaking the woman before him for anyone else. Ada Wong had made sure to leave an impression on him that he was sure would last forever.

"Who are you?" Jill said with a cynical edge in her voice and for a moment Leon had almost forgotten she was there.

"Leon never mentioned me? I'm hurt. I thought what we had was special." She purred with the over exuberant mock upset that made him incredibly angry.

"Ada, what are you doing here?" He asked, the edge of hurt in his voice not to be missed. This woman had been afflicting him in ways no one had ever known about ever since the night he had found out she hadn't died after Raccoon. And even worse when he had found out that she had been working for Wesker of all people. That had stung in a way that no bullet ever had. Jill seemed to notice that something here wasn't as cut and dry as it had seemed and chose to keep her mouth shut, not wanting to bring anymore tension to the already stifling atmosphere.

"Well to be honest, I only just recently checked out. This hotel has horrible room service." A smirk upturned her lips and it only served to aggravate him further. He didn't have time for her little mind games and being in her presence seared into him like a hot knife, ripping up old wounds that had never healed in the first place.

"I don't have time for this shit right now. What were you doing here?" He raised his gun in her direction, slightly trembling hand giving away that he had never given real thought to using it on her. He knew he couldn't. She seemed to know this and moved closer to him, the smirk leaving her face as she knew that his business here was indeed important and he seemed to be on edge. She knew it best not to push him right now.

"Relax Leon, it's not what you think. I was doing a little sightseeing in town close by when I came across this place. I decided to investigate a bit further and found out some things I needed to look into. Probably the same reason why you're here." Her voice grew more serious and he lowered the gun, eyes narrowing in recognition.

"You mean Claire? You know where she is?" Jill tensed slightly at his side but he couldn't help but feel something of relief. If Ada knew where Claire was, surely she wouldn't keep it from him.

"Well...yes and no. Look Leon, I think it's best if we talk somewhere more private. First we should get out of here though. I have a little place set up in a few towns over, if you follow me back there I promise I'll explain everything I know to you."

Leon scoffed, unsure whether to trust anything she said. For all he knew she could abandon he and Jill at the first turn of danger. Something inside him however, told him that she wouldn't. Jill didn't seem so sure.

"Leon," Jill's voice lowered significantly although the raven haired woman across from them could obviously hear her, "I don't know about this. What if it's a trap?"

"It's our only choice right now and," His eyes darkened as he looked towards the one woman who had held his misguided affections for years but still caused him a tremendous amount of pain in the process. Still, they didn't have any other options, "I know her. She won't lead us into danger."

Jill didn't respond but instead followed after them as they started down the hall. She just wanted to information this Ada woman had and then she wanted to get Claire back.

And if she had to go into the depths of hell to do it, she'd go down three times over.

...


	3. III: Spread

_**DISCLAIMER: I do not own Resident Evil, or the characters used within. I own only my computer, my OC's, my imagination and a pretty kitty named Luna.**_

**Breaking The Glass**

**Sequel to Vas Domus**

...

**III**

**[Spread]**

...

_Death defying, this mess I'm buying  
>It's raining down with love and hate<br>And I find it hard to motivate_

...

The temperature in the living area of the facility had dropped significantly, leaving an extreme chill in the dry air that even Claire could feel as she woke slowly from what had felt like a decade's worth of a nap. The exhaustion had disappeared for the most part and she was almost sure it had something to do with coming in contact with Wesker's blood from earlier but if that was the case the way her body dealt with it was astounding. If that was how her virus treated another one entering her system than perhaps it could do that with other things like bacteria.

She could very well possibly never get sick again.

As much as she looked for all of the cons to being infected so far she could only really see mostly pros. The only real con she could find was being outcasted by her friends and society and in all honesty she already had been an outcast to begin with. Friends or otherwise. The only person she had ever_ really _patched things up with was Leon and while she and Jill were getting along now, she wasn't sure they had gotten to the point where they could be friends again. She knew that she had hurt the older woman to an extreme so in order to repair that relationship she'd have to try much harder than she had. The only reason that Leon and she had grown close again was because he had been so worried about her that he basically forced her to live with him, something she had only mildly discouraged.

Now however, she was back in this crappy situation where having any contact with either of them was unheard of. Honestly, she wasn't sure she wanted them to know where she was. She was certain to a fault that she didn't want them to know the secret lingering in her body and she was positive that if they found out about who she was with - previous secret not withstanding - she'd be shunned forever.

Or locked up somewhere in some room with white padded walls and recieving her meals in a plastic cup. Obviously that wouldn't go over too well.

So she'd play along for now and stay with Wesker even if half of the time he made her blood boil. He had this methodic way of pressing her buttons now that made her almost wish she hadn't brought him back from the dead in the first place. At the time she had been so upset, so sure she had felt something for him but now...

It didn't matter much anymore, she figured, it wasn't as if she could change things anyway. He was right earlier; he had saved her ass, more than once.

But being in debt to Wesker was like making a deal with the Devil and there was always a catch in the form of repayment that was always far too great to actually make good on. She exhaled slowly, getting out of the bed with the intent of climbing in the shower and scrubbing all of his blood off her body, forgoing switching the light on. She could almost see in the darkness and she knew where everything was anyway. The path from her modest bed to her modest bathroom was short and unhithered.

Or so she thought until her foot connected with something stiff on the floor and she stumbled, hissing out a curse as her knee rubbed against the carpet. She scrambled to her feet and walked over it, flipping the light switch on. The thing she had tripped over sat unmoved in the form of a large, plain, dark red gift box that certainly hadn't been there when she had fallen into bed a few hours before. She was unsure what to do with it and even though she was sure it was meant for her and her curiousity was nibbling at her like a rat with cheese she made no move to touch it. Instead she ignored it and decided to take her shower before popping it open.

"It's probably an arm or something gross like that." She snorted to herself even though she knew that was ridiculous; Wesker never threw away resources he could use.

The thought of him sitting in a dark laboratory chopping up body parts and laughing maniacally came unbidden into her head and she shuddered. It didn't seem like something he'd do but with his unpredictable nature one could never tell.

She slipped through the bathroom door and pulled back the plain green curtain, turning the knob all the way on the hot setting and ignoring the cold completely. Steam filled the room instantly and she let out a sigh of happiness as she slid into the water. She wet her hair and reached down for the bottle of plain shampoo that had been in the room when she moved in. Her hand met nothing but air and she looked down to find that the toiletries she had been using were gone. Instead there was a brand new set of shampoo, conditioner and body wash just like the kinds she had found in that hospital room a year in a half ago on the rack hanging on the shower head. That was the same night when she had almost been killed and Wesker had swooped in like an unorthodox knight in shining Mercedes and saved her. She picked up the body wash and opened it, breathing the same enchanting scent of vanilla, sugar and cashmere that she had grown to love so much.

He remembered. And that realization had her almost teary eyed but she pushed it back down and traded out the body wash for the shampoo, popping the cap open and pouring a generous amount in her hair, lathering up as the familiar scent brought back a slew of memories she'd rather not think about. Was this his way of apologizing for earlier? She couldn't help but be the slightest bit touched even if an actual apology would have been more preferred. But Wesker wasn't one for apologies, not even when he was still mortal, so whatever he would give she would take.

Plus it wasn't as if it had entirely been his fault in the first place. She had thrown the first stone, thrown a rather childish tantrum and goaded him into throwing that first hit.

She really didn't want to be toe to toe with him all the time, he just made her so angry sometimes. It really was odd how her demeanor had changed around him now than when they were sharing a space before.

She finished her shower slowly, taking the time to enjoy the heat of the water before rinsing off and getting out. She wrapped a towel around her body and one around her head before stepping out into the room, ignoring the chilly draft hitting her damp skin as she approached the box. She didn't bother getting dressed right then and knew it was because she just wanted to see what was in that box. Pulling the lid off slowly her breath caught in her throat at the contents. Inside was one of the most beautiful dresses she had ever seen, made of silky material and in a shade of dark teal that she knew would compliment the red in her hair beautifully. Holding it like a newborn baby she pulled it out slowly, admiring the hand embroided flower on the top of the dress before placing it on the bed. She returned her attention back to the box, finding it stuffed with other items as well. Her eyes lingered on something adorned with tiny jewels and made of a silky mesh material and she pulled it out.

It was a set of costume wings, like a fairy's wings but seemed much better made than ones she could find at a costume store. They were pretty, and sparkled in the low light of the bedroom. Before she could wonder what they were for a voice came from behind her.

"Good evening, dear heart. Did you enjoy your shower?"

She literally jumped two feet in the air, heart pounding from fear, "Jesus Christ, Wesker! I know you were probably a ninja in a former life but do you have to sneak up on me all the time?" Seriously, hadn't he ever heard of knocking? A small chuckle came from the blond who was leaning against the wall and she was suddenly reminded of her unmodest garb: a half wet towel barely covering her. That's the second time that's happened and she was beginning to fear showering at all around him, "Are you going to keep barging in on me half naked or am I going to have to take showers fully clothed now?" She asked indignantly.

"Dear heart, you wound me," His voice dropped slightly and it made goosebumps rise on her flesh, "It's not as if I am actively trying to see you naked."

"Yeah, could have fooled me. If you aren't going to leave can you at least pass me my robe? It's on the-" Before she could finish he was holding the terrycloth robe she had found in the room when she had gotten there. She slipped it on and tied it tightly before slipping the towel off under it and pulled her hair free to let it dangle damply across her shoulders. Her attention was once again drawn to the unexplored contents of the box, the dress and the wings. She exhaled softly, knowing that before she could ask what it was about there was something she needed to do first. She turned to him, still leaning against the wall and noticed that he was dressed in a manner that seemed overly casual for him. A pair of black jeans and a black tee made him seem less overbearing but it was still kind of odd.

"Look," She started, her skin rising to an uncomfortable heat as his scent drifted into her nose, "I'm sorry about earlier. I've just been cooped up here and I didn't mean to lash out at you like that." It came out much easier than she thought it would and she waited slightly tense as his eyebrow rose slightly before speaking.

"Dear heart, sometimes things get the best of you. I shouldn't have injured you." He shifted a bit looking a bit uncomfortable. Whether it was because he actually felt guilty or because he had to give her his version of an apology she didn't know but she immediately felt better, "I see you found the package I had sent here."

"Yeah, what's it all about?" She asked, somewhat more at ease now that everything had been cleared for the most part. She was still on edge around him of course but she didn't feel the overwhelming need to hurt him anymore. Her confusion crept back at the loss of that but she ignored it.

"There's an affair I have been asked to attend and I figured that you would care to join me. You would probably find more pleasure in it than I would." He moved from the wall to stand closer to her and the heat from his body mingled with the scent of him in a way that made her the slightest bit dizzy.

"What are the wings for?" She set down on the bed, taking the dress in her hands and ran one finger across the embroidery. Wesker crossed his arms and she could see him roll his eyes.

"It's a costume party."

She had to repress a laugh, the thought of Wesker attending something like a costume party quite amusing, "I never pegged you for the kind of person who went to things like that."

"I'm not but I'm afraid it's not optional. The man who's throwing it is an important benefactor to my company and it would be quite rude of me to accept his donations and not attend his party," Company? Sure she knew he had something going on but she hadn't any idea that he was running a company now. Flashes of Raccoon City and Rockfort made her tense up slightly.

"I see. Why do you want me to go?" He stiffened as she asked, and she noted that somehow being around her made him uneasy.

"Like I said before, you might enjoy the change of scenery." She raised an eyebrow at him but didn't touch it further, though she doubted that was _all_ he was doing. He never seemed eager to be in her company before, and she doubted his mind had changed on that much. He was leaving and he had to keep an eye on her, that's mostly what it was she was sure but still...

"Alright, I'll go. Not like I'm doing anything better, when is it?" She asked, not paying much attention as she went back to exploring the contents of the box on the floor. She removed three smaller boxes, opening the larger one first. Inside was a pair of strappy black heels with little stones on the straps the same color as the dress.

"We'll leave at seven."

"Tonight? I kind of wish I had been told this sooner." She huffed slightly but couldn't be in too bad of a mood. She was actually looking forward to getting out for awhile and she hadn't been to a party of any kind in forever.

"You'll have plenty of time to get ready. I'll collect you at fifteen til and it's six so I suggest you start now," He reached into his pocket and removed a satin box before placing it on her nightstand. Wordless he left and she stared after him for a moment before collecting the rest of the contents from the box. Bitterly she realized that he had apparently planned to present her in a certain way, if the small bag of makeup was anything to go on. Otherwise everything else looked quite appealing and maybe it would be fun to dress up nice for once. Even if she'd probably be paraded on his arm like some pretty trophy. She removed a curling iron from the box and sighed, he really did have all of his bases covered. She supposed she could deal with it if it meant that she might actually get to have a tiny taste of fun tonight.

Gathering her things she made for the bathroom, knowing full well that being on time was one of the things Wesker did perfectly. She didn't feel like being caught in the near nude again.

...

"Can I get you anything to drink?" The raven haired woman cooed, seemingly speaking to Jill and trying not to look at Leon.

"No, we're fine. We need the information you have, Ada." Leon responded, itching to do a slew of many things, one involving running away from the woman seated at the small table across from him. Strange when she was usually the one running away from safehouse she had brought them back to seemed to fit it's occupant well, dark and sleek just like it's owner. He wondered how many more she had.

"Your friend was in that facility but she...left a few days ago." Ada seemed the slightest bit uncomfortable but all the two were worried about were finding Claire. And Jill had the feeling that she couldn't trust this woman from the get-go, judging by the way Leon was acting around her. It was like the two were harboring some secret from her and aany other time the brunette would be bothered that she wasn't in on it but her priorities were much more important than some little lover's spat that was quite obvious.

"What do you mean 'left'? She was being kept in a tank." Jill said eyeing the woman suspiciously, "How could she just leave?"

"I'm not exactly sure how she got out but when I saw her she..." She paused, an almost amused look on her face, "_jumped_ off of the roof of the facility."

Leon gaped at her and Jill snorted, "She jumped off of a twenty-something foot tall building? That's ridiculous."

"It sounds that way, doesn't it? But I can assure you she did. I saw her."

"What about the man who took her? Who was that?" Leon spoke up, a little more forcefully than he meant but he really was on edge and he couldn't be sure that Ada wasn't just screwing with him. Claire just leaping off of a roof? And not being harmed? He couldn't see any deception in her coffee brown eyes but if there was one thing he did know about Ada it was that she was a very good liar.

"You saw who took her?" Ada seemed slightly surprised. So they didn't know...

"Yeah, he looked a lot like your _boss._" Jill's eyes widened at this and Leon's body tightened.

"Boss? Leon what are you talking about?"

Ada spoke before Leon could elaborate to Jill's query, "I don't work for him anymore. And it wasn't as cut and dry as you make it sound, Leon."

"You worked for Wesker?" Jill nearly screamed, but managed to keep it at a hoarse whisper, she turned to Leon angrily, "You knew about this and you followed her anyway? For all we know he's behind this whole thing!"

"I can assure you he's not but as to your previous question," Ada couldn't help but smirk, "The man who took Claire is his brother. He's also the owner of VitaLife. Alex Wesker." Jill's mouth opened slightly in surprise and Leon's eyebrow furrowed.

"That does explain the resemblance," He turned to Jill, "You worked with him for years, he never mentioned this?"

"He was very private. Chris once asked him if he had any family, all he did was shrug him off with a 'No'. We had no idea..." Jill placed her hand over her mouth, if this man was anything like her ex-Captain, Claire may be in more trouble than she thought.

"I trust you know by now that she's infected," Ada looked to the two and their silent admission was enough to tell her.

"How do you know that?" Leon asked, feeling even more antsy.

"I have my ways of finding things out, Leon. You should know that." Her eyes bore deep into his in an almost sensual way and despite the tenseness of the situation he felt a warmth pool in his stomach. Damn her, she was still affecting him.

"We found something about it on a computer at the facility. It didn't say what she was infected with, or when though," Jill shifted slightly, "I'm guessing it wasn't the T-Virus."

"No, T-Veronica actually. Apparently she's bonded with it quite well if you," She looked to Leon again, "never noticed it. Not to mention her dismount was perfect, if I do say so myself."

"Stop fucking with me Ada. Are you telling me she was infected this whole time?" Leon stood up, quite fed up with being led around. That wasn't possible, it couldn't be. Surely he'd have noticed if she was carrying the virus. He had read the report Chris had made after Antarctica about the Ashford girl. It had taken her fifteen years of stasis and she still couldn't completely control it. If Claire had been in contact with it there was no way she could have hidden it so well, not a volatile virus like Veronica.

Could she?

"You really don't know? She never said_ anything_?" Honestly Ada was surprised, a secret like that would surely be difficult to not expose. And as much as she hated bringing Leon bad news like this, she knew that she couldn't keep it from him. He had a right to know, "Miss Redfield came in contact with the virus a year ago. When she was living with Wesker."

Leon looked about ready to faint and Jill's hardened composure broke. She aimed her gun directly at Ada's head, her finger tensed on the trigger. Ada never even twitched.

"Jill-" Leon began but he was cut off.

"I knew we couldn't trust you. How dare you say something so horrible! Claire would never do something like that!" She looked ready to cry, so close to tears that she was trembling. Leon's laid his hand on her shoulder and pushed down her arm with the other hand.

"Ada, don't lie to us." Leon said, sounding exhausted.

"I'm not lying. It's all in that file on the table right there. You can see for yourself." Without taking his eyes off of Ada or his hand off of Jill, Leon reached over to grab the file, flipping through it and reading it slowly. Jill still look poised to kill but leaned over to read as well.

A long period of strained silence passed between the three before Leon spoke, handing the file to Jill,"Where did you get this?"

"A source of mine found it inside of one of Wesker's facilities, apparently the house had been forceably entered and both Wesker and Redfield were taken. It belonged to a former employee of Umbrella, Sergei Vladimir." Ada said, matter of factly. Jill eased slightly as if trying to remember something.

"Vladimir...that name sounds familiar. I think I remember Wesker mentioning it once."

"To you?" Leon's face was still ashen and pale but they still had a mission. He had to maintain composure, no matter what terrible things he had been hearing.

"No," Jill sighed, collapsing back into the chair, "It was...in Africa," She became very stiff, as if she was reopening a very deep wound,"I remember bits and pieces of things during...well... Anyway I overheard Wesker talking to someone on the phone. He said something about how Vladimir had long been taken care of. I didn't know what it meant at the time but it made me nervous later. The way he had said it, with such hate."

"Sergei always had it out for Wesker. He must have caught wind of Wesker's location and went to pursue him. I had initially heard that Wesker had killed him a few years back but I see that was not the case." Ada said quietly, placing her hands on the table.

"Wait...I thought Wesker died, Chris confirmed it when he returned with you after Africa."

"I thought he was too. I mean, I saw it with my own eyes! How he managed to survive that..." Jill trailed off.

"It came with some...side effects. As far as I know, he was human when Claire was with him." Ada said, once more taking in their surprised expressions. Before they could ask the question she could see lurking behind their eyes she answered it instead, "I don't know why she was with him, that was something I never could find out."

"Maybe he infected her?" Leon said, resigning to this disturbing fact. It certainly did account for those months she was missing for. And that would mean that Wesker was most likely the one who left her at his door a year ago. But why? None of this was making sense. Why would Claire ever willingly stay with Wesker? If he was human she would have known, she could have easily escaped. Maybe he kept her locked away, but that still didn't explain why he would have wanted her to begin with.

"I doubt it," Ada stood up and walked to the kitchen, bringing a two glasses of wine and a bottle of beer with her before setting the glasses in front of her place and Jill and the beer in front of Leon. He looked at it for a moment before pulling the top off and taking a swig. As much as he needed to be alert, he knew that one beer wouldn't hurt and he needed the edge off. Ada sat back at the table and continue, "I'm pretty sure she came in contact with the virus right before she ended up with you."

Leon furrowed his brow, "How do you know she was with me?"

"That's not really important is it?"

Jill tensed slightly but looked at Ada with pleading eyes, "What about now? Do you know where she is now?"

"She's...safe."

"She's with Wesker again." Leon said into his beer bottle. Somehow he just knew.

"Yes, she is but I can tell you one thing," Ada's eyes were on Jill now, something in the way she looked at her was almost as if she were trying to comfort the other woman and Leon was slightly taken aback, "She's much safer with him than she was with Alex. I know that without a doubt. Alex wanted her virus and I'm sure he's still looking for her. Wesker will make sure that he doesn't get it."

"Even if that's true, who's to say that Wesker isn't after the same thing?" Jill said, running her finger around the rim of her untouched wine glass.

"He had six months to infect her and he didn't, plus," Her eyes softened slightly, "He cares for her."

Jill's eyebrow arched and Leon hung his head, "Wesker doesn't 'care' for anyone, why would Claire be any different?"

"I don't know much of the detail and I wasn't there but I know Wesker, he wouldn't do this for anyone else. She's, in his own way, important to him. And not because of T-Veronica."

Leon leaned back in his chair, throwing his hands on the top of his head, staring at the stucco ceiling, "So what do we do now? Just leave her with Wesker?"

"If you want her to survive this, then yes. Alex has a distinct hatred for his brother but he won't approach him without having the virus first, Wesker outranks him by far. He knows it's a fight he won't win. Perhaps when Wesker was human, yes but somehow he got reinfected, it's a risk he won't take. He's much more cowardly than his brother."

"Leon-" Jill turned to him, her hazel colored eyes almost sad.

"There's nothing much we can do, Jill. I want to find her as much as you do but if that guy is after her, we really can't do much to keep her safe. And as much as I hate this...maybe he can."

"You're serious? The man is insane! You know what he did to..." She trailed off, not wanting to speak of the horrors she had endured at the tyrant's hand. Leon leaned forward and placed a comforting hand on her shoulder, not missing the way her body stiffened at his touch.

"You know I don't like this either, Jill, but what else is there?" He said, trying to be firm but sensitive at the same time. The matter of what had happened in Africa was probably something that would haunt her until the day she died; he didn't want her to bring up something that would only serve to upset her more. This whole affair involving Claire was upsetting enough, without the added insult.

"I-I don't know. I just don't want her to get hurt, in any way." She spoke to the table, sighing slowly as tears sprung to her eyes. She had made Chris a promise, a promise to keep his sister safe at all costs and just leaving her in the hands of his most hated enemy was the worst kind of treason. She knew Leon was right though, if Ada was being honest in what she said. Jill knew she'd have to do something that she never thought she'd ever have to do.

She would have to trust Albert Wesker.

...

Claire wished she had a full length mirror. Even if she felt slightly uncomfortable in the snug dress that flowed nearly to her feet and hugged every curve she had perfectly, she knew that she looked damn good in it. She looked into the mirror that she did have, noting with appraisal that she had managed to make herself presentable with as least makeup as possible. Her hair had taken almost forty five minutes but the loose ringlets that framed her face somehow made the red shade brighter and even though she had never been one for wearing her hair down, she had to admit it was quite pretty. Her entire ensemble was quite pretty and she wore it well. The only thing she wasn't keen on was the heels but she soldiered them on anyway, knowing that she couldn't go to a fancy party with boots on. At exactly ten until eight, and as she was applying the final touch to her look, the knock came patiently at her door. And an upsurge of anxiousness and fear along with it. Suddenly she was regretting even agreeing to go to this stupid party with him, and who knew what could become of it. What if he asked her to dance? She'd have to be close to him, she'd have to feel him, to smell him-

"Come in." She called from the bathroom, unsure of what to do, but breaking that last train of thought before it could leave the station. It was just a party, she reasoned, one night alone with him. She'd been alone with him before, and for longer. She had wrapped her arms around him tightly in a caring embrace. It wouldn't be like it was before, no, because it was different now. He was different and so was she. Nothing that she had felt with him had ever been explored. In a moment of brief stupidity she had wanted to, wanted nothing more, but he had effectively snuffed that out before a spark could even rise to flame. It wouldn't be different now.

He's just bringing you along to keep an eye on you, nothing more.

She listened nervously as the door opened and his light footfalls fell across the floor. At that moment she had wondered that if she locked the door if he would just go away.

This was a big mistake, she told herself, one that at the time seemed like a fun night out.

But it was too late now, wasn't it? He was out there, and waiting for her. She shook her head to part a few curls that had clung together and pulled half of her hair back into half ponytail, kept in place with a small black barette. She placed a sweaty palm on the doorknob and when the door opened it felt like the world was slowing down, time passing in hours instead of seconds. Immediately she was met with his back and she felt incredibly small in comparison. He was picking up the box that he had left on the nightstand, one that she hadn't taken the time to look at before he slowly turned. Of course he was dressed in all black, but he was wearing an attractive suit complete with diamond cufflinks. The smallest of smiles graced his handsome face as he appraised her, time slowing to an almost halt as she held her breath.

God, he was attractive and suddenly she could remember why she had developed feelings for him in the first place.

"Breathtaking. That color is phenomenal on you, dear heart."His voice was soft and smoldered like dying flame. Normally she would have been floored by a compliment like that from anyone but from Wesker it had rendered her speechless, her heart pounding loudly in her ears and she felt dizzy.

"Ah-thanks." She stumbled and moved towards him, trying in vain to not stumble but those damned heels weren't making for a very graceful motion. He held out his arm for her to take and she caught sight of something white in his front pocket before placing her hand in the crook of his elbow. It appeared to be a mask and the thought of him wearing one was strange but somehow alluring. It was as if suddenly with the change of atmosphere, her priorities had shifted and left her wanting to touch him or feel him. It was a dangerous thing but one that she knew was as intoxicating as the finest liquor.

"One minute, dear heart." He halted so suddenly that she almost tipped forward as her center of gravity shifted but luckily she had his sturdy arm to prevent it. His hand went to his pocket and removed the black box from earlier and turned towards her, pulling the lid open and revealing a stunning green gem, large and rectangular, encased in black onyx.

"What's that for?" She asked, her voice the slightest bit awed. It sparkled in the low light of the room beautifully and she had to wonder how much a jewel like that would cost. It certainly wasn't cheap, that was for sure.

"It accompanies your dress. I left it on your dresser earlier but I suppose you were too busy to notice it." His voice was low, husky and suddenly very close to her ear. He removed the emerald from the box and reached up to clip it in her hair, right above her ear. She had to repress the shiver that shook through her when his ungloved hand brushed the side of her face.

"It's beautiful," She sighed, as one hand rose to her hair to stroke the gem there, "It must have been expensive." She finished, somewhat bitterly. Her bitter retort was only met with the low chuckle of the man near her, the way it reverberated in his chest so close to her shooting unwanted currents of energy low in her stomach.

"It matches the dress, dear heart. I can't be seen at an important gala with a woman who isn't anything less than stunning can I?" That statement left Claire feeling two different feelings in it's wake. The first and most unsettling was the fact that he had called her stunning, something that turned up her heartbeat and made her want to crawl into the furthest hole from him and hide. The other was that he was inferring that if she had gone as 'normal' Claire, it would only serve as an insult to him in front of all of his important 'friends' and 'coworkers'.

'But of course, he has a reputation to uphold, I'm sure.' Claire thought, with an unwanted twinge of hurt.

"It was in no way meant to offend you, dear heart." Claire's eyes snapped up at him in surprise. It was like he read her thoughts, or her face was just that easily read. She wasn't sure which she would have preferred.

When they reached the helicopter she realized that wherever they were going was somewhere away from this cold and dreary, ice covered state. And thank god for that too.

He helped her into the helicopter with the grace and carefulness of a man who took care of the things he felt he owned. Somehow instead of make her feel angry or bitter it only served to exhilirate her, although she shouldn't have been.

Things were beginning to take a toll for the worst and although she knew that being anywhere near him was dangerous territory, she almost felt right at his side.

Almost.

Of course she was still tentative, even if the comfortable non-hostile silence was a relief from early. She wouldn't let her guard down around him, not even for a second.

The ride was slightly lengthy but in no way long. She wanted to ask the stoic man at her side where they were going but decided to stay silent as not to break the quiet. It wasn't until something sparkling in the twilight of the brightly lit skyline caught her eye.

She had never actually seen it in real life and the textbook pictures and brochures had never done it any justice. Standing proudly against a layout of towering buildings was the Seattle Space Needle, glittering in the newly turned nighttime of the city below it.

It certainly served to answer her question and out of the corner of her eye she peered at the black-clad figure next to her. She could make out the tiniest of self-satisfied smirks as he noticed that she was clearly impressed with the location. She'd allow him that at least. A helicopter ride over one of the country's most prominent cities? It was indeed impressive, but not overly so. Afterall, it wasn't as if it was Paris and besides, she reminded herself, she was only there because he needed to keep an eye on her.

"I thought it was always raining in Seattle." She said, mostly to herself than him but he answered anyway.

"Not always. Just a good percentage of the time. It's expected to rain very late this evening but we'll have left by then."

Claire nodded absently and continued to peer down at the city below, noting the different cafes and coffee shops on every street corner.

Soon enough they were touching down on a rooftop heliport not too far away from the Space Needle and Claire couldn't help but continue to stare at it as Wesker offered her his hand. He told the pilot that he would notify him when they were ready to leave and the man nodded before taking off. A man in a black suit with a red bowtie met them at the front of a rooftop elevator, a big fake highly paid smile to match his obviously fake hair piece. Claire threw up her hand to hide her giggle as a cough.

"Doctor Wesker, it's an honor that you could join us this evening," He reached his hand out and Wesker returned the gesture, although much stiffer than Toupee Guy, "And your lovely friend as well." He reached out and grabbed Claire's hand to kiss it, bending down slightly in a way that made his hair piece slip down a bit. Claire scrunched her face up just the tiniest bit to hold back the laugh that begged to come out but managed to hold it in and return his kind gesture.

"The pleasure is all mine." She said with a smile that wasn't fake at all. She noticed that Wesker had become unusually stiff by her side and she wondered if it had something to do with the fact that Toupee Guy had kissed her hand.

'Yeah right, he's probably constipated. He should have some more Metamucil, the old geezer.' Another laugh caught itself in her throat and she wished halfheartedly that something sad would happen so she could stop cracking up at everything. One of the true signs that she was horrendously nervous.

The man led them into the elevator and on the ride down made idle chit chat with Wesker that Claire wasn't paying attention to. She was too busy noticing the sheer elegance of the elevator, something that shouldn't have been elegant at all, with it's marble floor and it's golden buttons. She didn't even notice as the elevator came to a stop and Wesker's hand gently gripped her elbow to lead her out. Without a goodbye the man had started the elevator up back to the roof to meet other people arriving by helicopter and Claire found herself alone with the tyrant in a hallway with blood colored velvet tapestries and similar marble floor.

"Is everything alright, dear heart? You seem nervous." His voice purred in her ear as he led her down the hallway, which seemed obscenely long.

"Just fine." She muttered halfheartedly, eager to get something to drink since her throat felt like someone had rubbed it against a carpet. He came to a stop about six feet in front of a set of giant double doors and turned to her, grabbing her arm as gently as she supposed he could. He removed a syringe from his coat and she flinched, eyes wide.

"What the hell is that for?" She nearly screamed but managed to keep her voice bordering on a rough whisper.

"Relax, dear heart. It's just a small dosage of the antivirus I finished today. It will ensure that your virus stays in check, we don't need you losing control tonight." He said softly and the close proximity of his body near hers shot a bolt of electricity through her gut and settled into the apex between her legs uncomfortably. She relaxed and allowed him to inject her, knowing full well that he was right, the last thing she needed was for her virus to decide to pull in the reigns in front of a load of people. It took barely a second and when he was done she felt slightly dizzy but it quickly went away as he recapped the syringe and placed it in his coat pocket. She went to pull away and continue down the hall but he didn't move and she looked up at him questioningly.

What she saw made her breath catch in her throat painfully.

He had removed his glasses and instead of vermillion serpentine eyes looking down at her were a pair of ice cold blue ones in their place. A thousand memories of before flooded her and for a moment she thought she would cry but stayed unmoved outwardly.

"Your eyes-" Her voice was a bit hoarse with a lump lodged in it and he let a smile through that normally stoic face of his. It was like with a change of eye color he had become someone completely different. The Wesker that she had known before was now standing in front of her and it was like the monster that he had been moments ago was gone.

Two different sides of the same coin, she thought sadly.

"No one knows about my condition. I felt it unnecessary to cause a scene this evening." God, why couldn't she stop staring at him? That blue gaze of his pierced through her and made her remember things she would have rather have forgotten, a life that she had left behind. A life that, while brief, had left an imprint in her memory better than she had realized now that his seemingly evil visage had slipped away and she was faced with her ice cold reminder.

"Are those contacts?" She asked, wanting strongly to touch his face but kept them by her side. Of course they were contacts, it wasn't as if he were human again. That was absurd.

"Indeed," He removed the white thing from his pocket and placed it on his face, the mask quite strange but oddly fitting. It was tantamount to the one from Phantom of The Opera and while it was weird seeing him wearing such a thing, she couldn't deny that somehow it made him look all the more handsome, "Are you ready, dear heart?" He raised his elbow again and this time when she took it, she couldn't help but feel like it was right thing to do this time.

...

The room was full of people, all of whom she didn't recognize but that was to be expected. She stayed attached to Wesker's arm while he greeted and introduced her to several men in classy suits and their fur-wearing, diamond sporting wives or mistresses, charm spouting off as fake as the handsome smile on his face. She didn't miss the way a few woman narrowed their eyes at her in an obvious jealous glare at the fact that she was with Wesker. She was more interested in the thing he had in his other hand though. He held a glass of amber colored liquor and though Claire couldn't tell what it was, she knew that she wanted some. As a waiter passed by she grabbed a glass of champagne off his tray and tried as best she could to not chug it one go.

"Albert Wesker, look at you, as handsome as ever." Claire's head snapped in the direction of the slightly raspy female voice as a more genuine smile graced Wesker's face. Claire raised her eyebrow, looking at the older woman with interest and drained her bubbly drink. She was certainly dressed to impress in a sleek but not overdone black dress. The only sort of costume apparel she had on was a witch hat which Claire found much more interesting than all of the overdone costumes most of the other women had on. Her grey-streaked black hair hung in slight waves over one shoulder and she had a simple spider brooch on the front of her dress.

"Frances, as charming as ever. It's such a pleasure to see you, I wasn't expecting to find you here." Wesker took the woman's hand and instead of kissing it, shook it instead. She tossed her head back slightly and laughed which made Claire smile. She was interested to find out what made this woman worthy of one of Wesker's rare smiles. It wasn't like he was just handing them out.

"I could say the same for you, Al," Claire's eyebrow almost disappeared into her hairline. Al? "And who is this lovely young lady?" Her blue eyes shifted over to Claire who gave a sheepish smile. Something about this woman was utterly familiar but she knew without a doubt she had never seen her before.

"Frances, this is Claire Redfield. Dear heart, I'd like you to meet Dr. Frances Birkin, she used to be one of Umbrella's most esteemed researchers." Claire couldn't help the way her mouth dropped at the mention of the last name.

"Redfield you say? You wouldn't happen to be the same Claire Redfield that helped my Sherry out in Raccoon City would you?" Her eyes crinkled slightly as she extended her hand to Claire and Claire took it, mouth still slightly agape.

"Frances is Sherry's grandmother. William's mother." Wesker clarified.

"It's so nice to meet you." Claire replied, somewhat dumbstruck.

"And you, my dear. Sherry spoke so highly of you, to think I'd be getting a chance to meet you. Wonderful."

"She did?" Honestly she wasn't too surprised but she was sure that Sherry didn't remember her now. It had been quite a few years since they had parted ways that night, "Is she here?" Wesker stiffened considerably at her side, as if bringing Sherry up made him uncomfortable. She wouldn't see why it would but one could never tell with the blond, he was as stable as an atom bomb.

"Oh no, Sherry's not one for stuffy affairs like these. No, she's off with a few friends this evening. I tried to get her to come along but you know teenage girls." The Birkin matriarch smiled wistfully and she could see a tiny bit of sadness behind those familiar blue eyes. Sherry's eyes.

"Dear heart," Wesker interjected quietly, tugging on her elbow slightly but sternly. "Why don't you fetch yourself a drink, I need to speak with Frances in private a moment."

"Oh okay. Well it was really nice meeting you," She took the elder woman's hand again, this time tighter than before. It was as if she was a link piecing Claire and Sherry together again, if only for a moment and it enforced the fact that Sherry was safe with her family instead of deep below ground in a lab like Claire had feared, "Tell Sherry I said 'Hi'?"

"Of course, she'd be delighted to hear from you. Here," She moved her hand to her purse and pulled out a little card, passing it to Claire with a motherly smile, "You call me if you ever need anything, you hear?"

"Thank you so much. I will." For the first time in what seemed like a long time, Claire felt a flicker of hope in her heart and she walked away to give the other two privacy to talk.

Little did she know that a predator had been waiting for her to be alone all night.

...

"She's pretty, Albert." He didn't miss the snarky smirk or the spark in the older woman's eyes as the redhead in question walked away. He narrowed his eyes and turned back to Frances.

"She's...something. What are you doing here?" He lowered his voice to a dangerous whisper that anyone would be afraid of. She still retained the smirk that had made home on her face. She had never been afraid of Albert Wesker, even when most cowered under his obvious authority. To her he would always be that overworked boy that spent ninety nine percent of his life buried in his lab, desperately trying to rise above and beyond. Not that he ever had much trouble.

"Garrett's wife is an old friend of mine. Naturally I'd be invited."

"Naturally..."

"So, if memory serves me correctly you worked alongside a Redfield in your old police unit. I'm assuming she's a relative, Redfield isn't a very common name."

"She was his sister." Wesker looked after Claire, stiffening as a man cloaked in all black and green approached her at the bar. Apparently he had made a joke she found amusing and she threw her head back slightly in a laugh. He watched the way her chest reddened slightly and the slight blush and tiny smile on her face indicated that he must have given her compliment. Something burned slightly in his gut.

"I see. And just what is she doing with you?"

"I'm...looking after her." Frances chuckled at this.

"No doubt. I just remember that you never cared much for your old teammate. William told me he grated on your nerves. Though that's not a hard accomplishment." His body tightened considerably at the mention of his old friend and colleagues name, "You were his best friend, Albert."

"Frances-"

"Let me finish, boy." Her smile disappeared from her face and was replaced with a small frown of regret and old sorrow filled her blue eyes. If anyone else had addressed him as such, they would be on the floor dead right now. He didn't even harden, in fact his body went lax just the slightest bit, "You know I don't blame you for what happened. William's...death was his own fault. What happened in Raccoon was a horrible circumstance of his foolish hunger for power. You both had a hand in it I'm sure but I know it doesn't entirely fall on your shoulders. I read the reports, the _real_ reports," She looked to him to see if he would respond but he remained silent and she continued," I know what Umbrella was capable of, I always knew. The fault of what happened falls more on my shoulders than yours, I should have tried to prevent William from following down my path but I wanted so much for him to be successful in that company. I knew of the dangers long before you or William ever did."

"Is that why you left?" Wesker's voice was taut and strained, as he looked through the crowd for a sight of red hair. He found her still at the bar.

"I left because I was too old to keep up with it anymore. I was there before Progenitor ever was discovered. I was part of the original team. I was allowed to retire eventually wasn't I?" She removed a pack of cigarettes out of her bag and shook one out, placing it in her mouth as Wesker presented her with a lighter, eyes still on the dance floor. He didn't respond and she peered past him to see what he was so keen on watching. She caught sight of Claire giggling as the man made another joke, "Seems another man is trying to stake your claim." She smiled and watched the very slight annoyance twitch the younger man's brow. In all of her years of knowing him she had never actually seen him with a woman and she had certainly never seen him watch after one like that.

"Don't be ridiculous. I feel nothing for her." He answered, a little to quickly to Frances' trained ear.

"I never said you did. But now that you mention it-"

"Frances." The tone was not missed and she chuckled.

"Alright, alright. Does she know?" Her voice took on a note of seriousness and he didn't even have to ask what she meant.

"Yes."

"I see," She snuffed her cigarette out in an ashtray settled on a table behind her, "Well I should be going, Sherry will be home soon and I promised to help her study for her BioChem exam over the weekend. Don't be afraid to contact me sometime. It was nice seeing you again, Albert."

"The same, Frances. Give Sherry my best." He kissed her hand lightly and soon she had disappeared in the crowd. He watched as she turned at the door to nod her head in Claire's direction, who was still at the bar, talking with another man he didn't recognize.

Albert Wesker was not a jealous man, jealousy would be admittance to a feeling he did not have, but he was awfully possessive about the things he kept. Though he never felt as if he had kept the lovely younger Redfield, per se, he knew that there were certain aspects of her that he felt he was entitled to. Though not romantically he knew that in a way she belonged to him, she owed him certain things. Such as the power she had come to acquire and in many circumstances, her life.

It would make sense that he would feel the burn of indignance in his gut at the soft throaty chuckle coming from the woman at the bar not too far away in response of something said by the man so obviously trying to woo her affections. What did not make sense however, was the anger boiling up in his veins as the man placed his hand on the small of her back, or the pride he felt when she pulled away from his grasp with an almost nasty look on her face as he said something she apparently thought offensive. And though he was not a man for rescue, he felt it his owner's responsibility to take her from her uncomfortable position. With the fluid movements only he could be capable of, he came behind her and placed his hand on her shoulder, causing both her and her wooer to turn around.

"Having a nice time?" He slithered in her ear, noting amusedly the shudder that he felt as she was faintly pressed into his front. His eyes traveled quickly to the slightly grey haired man who had developed a frozen stance in response to his arrival and he recognized him as a smaller employee from a rival company. He did not know his name nor did he care much. It didn't seem to matter as the sullen faced man slunk away and back into the crowd, obviously noting that the woman he had been so keen on was there with a highly regarded member of the pharmaceutical community.

"You're lucky that you came back when you did. Another four seconds and he would have been on the ground holding his crotch. Men are such pigs." She took a rather undainty sip of the martini she had been nursing and he let a low chuckle in response.

"Indeed they are. I think he liked you." His voice was low and amused but inwardly he wasn't very amused at all. Should it really bother him that another man found interest in her? No, but it did. Of course he chalked it up to the fact that she owed him a various amount of things and she needed to repay him on that before she went running off with random men. Not that she would.

No, his dear heart didn't take pleasure in things like that. Not at heart anyway.

"I don't care if he wanted to buy me an island, you didn't hear what he said." The frown on her face was soon drowned away in another gulp of her drink.

"I can imagine, dear heart. Tell me, would you care to dance?"

"Dance? With you?"

"How else would that be interpreted?"

"No...it's just I've never really figured you to be someone who danced. Then again, I never figured that you'd be hanging out at costume parties with old friends either." The look on her face was priceless and Wesker smirked.

"I hardly define this as 'hanging out' and if by 'old friends' you are referring to Mrs. Birkin, I can assure you her presence here was as much of a surprise to me as it was to you." His hand slipped onto the small of her back and he reveled in the soft flesh there, burning through his glove. She shivered again and turned to him, dark lashes raising slowly to meet his eyes. He could see the faintest of gold in her placid blue orbs form and he felt his pulse raise just a bit.

"Why didn't you ever mention her?"

"You never asked, dear heart."

"No but with all of your extensive knowledge about _everything_ I would have figured that you would have known that I'd like to know that Sherry was safe." He could see the smallest bit of hurt in her eyes and for a moment an apology nearly slipped through his lips.

"Dance with me. We can talk more about it later if it suits you."

She didn't understand why he wanted to dance but she supposed one little dance wouldn't hurt. She'd just be pressed against him, with hips moving and his hand awfully low on her back.

Nah, she'd be fine.

Taking his hand he led her to the floor, as a slower tune played. She honestly couldn't hear the music too well because he had pulled her closer than she would have cared for and her heart was beating strongly in her ears. His hand was situated on her lower back, his leather glove cool against her skin.

"Wesker?" Her voice was tentative.

"Yes?"

"Do you remember that last night... at the house?" She didn't know how else to put it but the urge to know some things neither had been able to talk about had been strong for quite some time.

"Clearly." Unless she was mistaken she swore she heard something in that normally cool voice of his but she brushed it off as her imagination.

"Why...did you want me to leave?" Inside of her mind there was a voice screaming at her, telling her that honestly she didn't want to know and that asking him something like that was just looking for trouble. Unfortunately that voice might have been right, considering she felt him stiffen up against her.

"That's not really important, dear heart. Besides, you know how unstable I was in my...condition." He leaned in at the last part and she shuddered against him at the feel of his warm breath on her ear. He really had to stop doing that. She snorted quietly, repositioning her hand at the nape of his neck and absentmindedly started playing with the hairs there. His hair was so soft.

"I just can't believe you consider being human a _condition_ but this is normal."

"It's normal for me, dear heart. Perhaps not to you but to me it's far more normal than your adored humanity." He had probably meant for that to sound sarcastic or snarky but it didn't sound like either to her. It was like he was explaining basic math or telling her what the weather was like. He was so sure of himself that it made her second guess herself.

"I'm not normal..." She muttered, averting her eyes to his chin and he laughed.

"Dear heart, even before the virus you were never _normal_. Normal is a state of mind. Why would you enjoy being weak?"

"It's not that! It's just... I don't even know why I'm talking about this to you. You don't understand." She sighed and he brought her even closer to him and she didn't resist.

"I understand far more than you think." After that there was nothing left to say and she just allowed him to take control of the movements. How was she supposed to respond to that? She wondered why it was so easy for him to accept what he was but for her it seemed impossible. Was it acceptance? Because she was afraid that no one would be left to care to know her or even be in her presence?

"Are you... I mean can you... Ugh, nevermind." Too late though, because she knew that she was going to have to ask the question now that she had brought it up. She should have kept her mouth shut but it was something that had been burning in her head since she had woken up at Leon's a year ago.

"Ask." His statement to continue should have been reassuring but she was kind of afraid that he would take it the wrong way and- ah screw it.

"Can you have children?" She blurted and though she wanted to hide her face she didn't, instead looking at him to guage his reaction.

"I honestly do not know if I am able to reproduce. Is that what you're so concerned about, dear heart? That you cannot mother a child?" There was no condescending tone and no rudeness, something she was thankful for.

"Doesn't every woman?" She sighed into his shoulder, looking awfully disdainful. He didn't say anything for a moment and she decided that maybe he didn't know how to response. He had probably never even given thought to having children so she was sure he didn't see why that would make her upset. Before this had happened though, at one point in her life, she had wanted children. Now that there was a possibly that she could not she questioned the option again.

"If you would like, when we get back to the facility, I could do a fertility test," Her head snapped up at this. That was an awfully kind thing to offer, especially for Wesker. She'd decided that it would make her feel better just to chalk it up to his love of digging around and prodding inside of people, "Though I have to warn you, dear heart, attempting to have sex with a normal human most likely would have dire consequences. I would not recommend that, you could infect someone, at least without proper protection."

Claire snorted, "It's not like I was going to. I just...would rather know. Does it hurt?"

"It requires me to do a full pap smear and vaginal exam, as well as removing one of your eggs for testing." His voice was so cool and normal but Claire's face dropped. He'd have to put his hand inside of...that? It made all of the sense in the world and she didn't know how she wasn't aware of that. Honestly she figured maybe he could check her blood or something. Guess not. Her face must have gone ten shades of red because he chuckled at her expression, "I am a doctor, dear heart. I would treat you as nothing more than a patient, in case you were worried about that. If it would make you feel better I could sedate you first."

Claire ignored the vaginal exam and went directly for the egg extraction, "How would you remove one of my eggs?"

"Are you sure you want to know, dear heart?" He asked, raising an eyebrow at her and smirking. Not really no, but she felt it better to ask him now in case she did allow him to do a fertility test. He took her silence as permission to continue, "I would take a large needle and use it to penetrate your ovary and extract an egg. I've been told it can be quite uncomfortable." She shifted and sighed as the song ended. He went to pull away from her but stopped a moment.

"I need to go speak to a few more people and then we can leave. Get yourself another drink, dear heart, you look like you need it."

She didn't miss the smart allecky way he had said that or that it was the truth. She could use something strong, if just to calm her nerves. And her wildly beating heart.

...


	4. IV: Shatter

_**DISCLAIMER: I do not own Resident Evil, or the characters used within. I own only my computer, my OC's, my imagination and my dozens of unpublished and unwritten stories. **_

_**A little bit of review response before we continue, since I didn't get around to it before:**_

_**Ripsi: Budddddy! I'm glad you're pleased and let me say as a HUGE fan of your work, it makes it ultra special that you've been following my own work. Optio has been like my fanfiction staple since I began reading it. About Leon, yeah he is but I think anyone who knows me can say that I don't give Leon a lot of credit, even really where it's due. Though when I was writing the first chapter I didn't really think about that. I just sort of started writing and ran with it, so... OH and you should know, I plan on rewriting Vas Domus as a little side project - along with my other 800 side projects. But I sincerely appreciate your critique because I know what a wonderful writer you are and I just finished reading A Vicious Cycle and I gotta say, I totally dig Kick. She's my favorite OC! It's so difficult to write OCs without Mary-Sue'ing em up and you did wonderful! Keep on reading and I will too. I wait with bated breath for the next chapter of Optio. **_

_**AryaRiker: Thank you so much! I had a good time writing it but I do plan on rewriting it because I don't find it to be as detail oriented as I would like. A lot of my problems with writing stem from not transitioning from one subject to another smoothly. Thanks so much for reading and following and I promise you will get more whenever I am able to get it to you!**_

_**hakukaen: Your bribes are the fuel I need to keep going and thank you. Inspiration is a difficult thing to come by these days, I wish I could just buy it at the store. I won't lie though, I do tend to find inspiration in the oddest things. As for the party...Wesker's Phantom of The Opera mask was inspired by an XNALara model I found lol, for example. Just weird things like that but thanks for keeping track and staying with me!**_

_**Naoko Suki: We go back huh? Lol. Far enough. You have been reading my stories since I began really posting on here and you have no idea how much I love love love ya for it. You also give me lovely reviews for every chapter which I appreciate so much and always look forward to. Needles dont bother me that much but I know that even the most tough girls have one or two things that make em squeamish, although a huge needle in my hip would scare the crap out of me lol. And yeah I wanted to dress em up, I even did a picture for it which I'll post in a bit just check out my deviant Art account on my homepage. Actually I have a lot of pics I made I haven't put up yet, so...thanks for reminding me! Keep reading and reviewing, you always up my spirits with your reviews.**_

_**elevenzombiezz: You've been following my stories too for quite some time! You have no idea how much I appreciate that. You guys are one of the things that keep me pushing on when I feel like I couldn't write one more chapter. The whole reason I pushed myself to finish Vas Domus was because of you, my readers, my fans. Lol, that sounds weird. Anyway, I thank you from the bottom of my heart.**_

**Breaking The Glass**

**Sequel to Vas Domus**

...

**IV**

**[Shatter]**

...

_Put on your pretty lies, you're in the city of wonder  
>Ain't gonna play nice, watch out you might just go under<br>Better think twice, your train of thought will be altered  
>So if you must falter be wise<br>_...

When Claire returned from the party she made straight for her room, faking a yawn and for some reason feeling uncomfortable from the evening's events. She wasn't actually tired, and mostly her feet were just sore but she didn't feel like staying around him for any longer than necessary. He had been the perfect gentleman this evening and it did nothing to soothe her and ultimately confused her even more. Despite her course of fleeing the living room, Wesker seemed to have a different idea, grabbing her wrist before she could hit the stairs.

"Dear heart, just a moment," Confused she turned around and watched him remove one of those god-awful syringes again and uncap it. She sighed as he took her arm, "It's better you be protected don't you think?"

"I guess... It just burns." She lied, not caring if he called her on it. She really hated shots of any kind.

"It does not burn. There," He was done already? She hadn't even felt that, "Don't let me keep you." Contrary to that statement he hadn't released her arm and she raised her eyebrow at him. However when he finally did let her go she didn't move. She felt she should at least thank him for taking her out and letting her have some fun. They stood in silence for a few moments before she leaned up on her tiptoes and slid her lips across his cheek. The kiss was brief and impersonal, the way she had preferred it but inside the sensation of his skin on her lips made her feel very warm inside. She looked up at him and found him smiling just the smallest bit. Good, he wasn't angry, though his eyebrow was raised in a way that made it felt like he was going to tease her.

"And just what was that for?" He asked, his voice sounding almost...playful. If Wesker didn't do playful she might have assumed it was. At a loss for anything else to do she shrugged.

"I just wanted to thank you for taking me with you tonight. You could have left me here and you didn't so... I appreciate it." Maybe she was smiling but she couldn't tell, her lips were numb. A freaking kiss on the cheek shouldn't have made her feel so weird. It was like a kiss she would have given a friend or her brother but somehow this man had a tendency to exaggerate everything she did and every feeling she had by his presence alone.

"It was my pleasure, dear heart. You made good company." She couldn't believe it, was that a real smile on his face? And he had said it was his pleasure. Well, gee golly.

"Well... Goodnight Wesker." She turned to walk down the hall and a part of her was sorry he didn't stop her but she was somewhat glad he didn't. She didn't want to make this situation weird and hanging around any longer than that might have. She didn't stop until she reached her room and she heard his voice behind her.

"Sleep well, dear heart."

...

Claire sat by the telephone in Wesker's office, tapping her fingers against the cradle and blew out exagerratedly. Honestly it was just one little phone call, what was there to be nervous about anyway? It had taken enough courage as it was to even ask him if she could make the call in the first place and he had been awfully receptive to it. Even offered to allow her the use of his own personal office to do so in. She didn't want to waste his very rare good nature, one which she had been seeing a lot more of lately. He was much less high strung though by no means was he relaxed but he was more at ease.

He was around her at least.

Weaving the little white card between her fingers she ran her other hand along the spine of the phone, watching the plain screensaver weave in and out on the locked desktop across from her. She hadn't actually checked if it was locked because she in no way wanted to fall out of Wesker's so-called good graces but knowing him it definitely would be. She briefly wondered what he kept on it but she was sure she pretty much new already. It wasn't like he'd be looking up porn or anything...

...

...or would he?

Quickly deciding that she would honestly rather not know if her 'gracious' host kept visual masturbatory aids on his computer she finally picked up the phone and dialed the number on the card before she could chicken out again.

She waited through three rings while holding a very large breath and was about to hang up through the fourth when a giggling voice rang out femininely.

_"Birkin residence!"_

"Umm...yes...is Frances there?" Claire blew out the breath she was holding and inside her head a little voice was squalling out 'Omigod! It's Sherry!' even though she had no idea if it actually was Sherry. If it was she certainly sounded more womanly than the little pre-teen squeak of her younger years.

_"Yeah, just hold on one second okay?" _Well, if it was Sherry she hadn't recognized her voice, though that wasn't surprising. It had been a long time ago since the Raccoon incident and Sherry had only been with her for a day. Ten years was a pretty long time to actually really remember someone's voice.

_"This is Frances Birkin, how can I help you?"_

"Hello, umm...it's Claire Redfield, we met at that party the other-"

_"Yes dear I remember. Old age hasn't quite gotten me yet. It's nice to hear from you, Claire. Honestly I didn't know if you'd actually call, you seemed a bit spooked the other night." _Frances laughed and Claire felt the tension ease from her shoulders, the previous nervousness she had been concerned with was melting away. Oh it felt good to talk to someone _else_ for a change. A pleased smile settled on her face as she twirled in Wesker's sturdy leather office chair.

"Of course I was going to call. How could I not?"

_"My charm is just that irresistible, I know. How are you doing? And better yet, how's that oh-so esteemed Dr. Wesker doing?" _ Claire could hear the same pretty voice that had answered the phone asking Frances who she was talking to. The older Birkin must have waved her away or something because soon the other line was quiet, save for Frances.

"I'm doing well, he's okay too I guess. We don't see much of eachother." Claire really hadn't meant for that to sound as sullen as it came out and unfortunately for her Frances picked up on it.

_"It sounds like that bothers you, dear. Though he's always been such a solitary boy, especially when he first started at Umbrella." _Her voice seemed almost wistful and Claire had to repress the snort at the word 'boy' being used in reference to Wesker, who was, undoubtedly, the manliest of men. Or so he believed.

"You knew him before he started working at Umbrella?" Claire couldn't help the surprise in her voice and Frances chuckled in response.

_"I did indeed. However I doubt he would very much appreciate me talking about his childhood, or at least within his earshot. Say, why don't you join Sherry and I for lunch this afternoon? I know she'd love to see you and we can talk more." _ At that the other voice cried out loudly, demanding to know who exactly she was having lunch for to which Frances replied that it was a surprise. Honestly, Claire would have absolutely adored meeting the two for lunch, the sheer excitement of seeing Sherry again was enough without the added perks. However she highly doubted that Wesker would let her go and she sighed quietly. Since when did that man become her father?

Okay...ew.

"I wish I could but I don't think Wesker will let me go." Claire said forlornly and Frances chuckled.

_"Sweetie, I'm sure he would but if it makes you feel better, I'll take care of it. See you in an hour, dear." _Before Claire could protest, or even ask how she was going to get to go anywhere what with being in the middle of Jesus Nowhere the line went dead and she threw it a quizzical glance before putting it down on the cradle. She knew it was probably in her best interests to at least tell Wesker that the Birkin matriarch was up to something but she didn't want to bother him if he was working.

And he was always working.

With a sigh she propped her chin on her fist and settled her elbow on the desk. She should probably be leaving the office but something about being there made her feel good, it was a pretty nice room even if that wasn't saying much in this place. As stated earlier, this place was the pits. The sound of the heater clicking on and the residual hum thrummed through her ears and for some reason her eyes started to grow heavy. She tried to fight sleep, her head slipping down waking her up everytime. However the scent of him surrounding the chair, only exacerbated by the warmth seeping through the vent underneath her and the hum of the heater were lulling her down. Soon her head met wood softly and she smiled slightly before her eyes closed one final time.

...

"Scalpel."

His one word command was all he needed to get the sharp instrument in his hand and the three assisting him at his side were completely focused on their tasks. It was best that you were when working with Albert Wesker, after all if anything went wrong it could very well mean your life. All business his cool voice echoed throughout the autopsy room, echoing through the face mask on his hazmat suit. The others watched with rapt attention as he spoke into the voice recorder on the table, only one of them actually busy with pinning down the flesh on the cadaver.

"Subject shows signs of pre-mortem organ dissolution; kidneys and liver are completely deteriorated as is the heart. Stomach and both the small and large intestine still intact."

His eyes narrowed behind his tinted face plate and he spoke softly, taking the scalpel and making a long incision in the ropey muscle of the lower intestine, "Obscure object is lodged between the anal canal and the colon. Attempting removal for further study."

With no word necessary the person closest to him handed him a large pair of forceps and he took them and pulled out the obstruction, not paying attention to the horrified gasps of the team around him.

He was not a man of emotion, nor did he usually show it but something about what he was holding in his hand made him uneasy. Yes, it was terrible but he had seen things infinitely worse, more grotesque and far more wrong than this. For some reason his voice lowered to a slightly hoarse rasp as he placed the little limb on the tray on the table.

"Obstruction identified as a small arm. Possibly from a child." A very young child, barely out of toddlerhood if the size was anything to go by and this creature had swallowed it whole. His chest tugged slightly and he knew he had to wrap this up as soon as possible. He nodded to the woman across from him.

"Dr. Jenkins will oversee it from here. I have some business I need to take care of. Get stomach content samples and tissue from the alimentary canal." A chorus of 'Yes sir' was his response as he exited the autopsy room and into the vaccuum sealed space that was the first decontamination chamber. The hissing of the showers drowned out the thoughts he was having about what had just happened and he was grateful. When had he become so...

_'Soft?'_

No, not soft. He was never, nor would he ever be soft. It just made no sense as to why what he had just seen would have affected him like it did. But...

A child, no matter the reason, never deserved something like that and it was one of the only reasons why he had felt any guilt over his work. Just because he didn't particularly care for children didn't mean he wanted them to die, but sometimes they were a casualty and he dealt with it. So why was it bothering him now?

Honestly, he knew the reason but he'd never admit it. He exited the decontamination room and began to strip off his suit, hanging it in the vaccuum locker and walked into the second decon shower. The sting of the chemicals was almost pleasant, washing him free of the burden that seemed to be tilting on him. When the process was over he stepped into the elevator and immediately his cell phone began to ring. He flipped it open without actually looking at the number and his voice sounded with a sort of forced hardness as he answered.

"Yes?"

_"I see you haven't improved your telephone etiquette, Al. Such a shame, you could have been a wonderful telemarketer." _He couldn't help the slight smirk that lifted the corner of his mouth but he also couldn't help the slight annoyance edging into his nerves.

"Do I even want to know how you acquired my number, Frances?" He tried to make it sound like he was annoyed but he could not. Honestly the old woman's interruption was welcomed for the moment, as unusual as that seemed.

_"Do you even have to ask? Just because I'm not in the game anymore doesn't mean I've lost all of my tricks. You kids these days..." _ If there was anything to said about Frances Birkin, it was that with age it seemed that her sharp wit had gotten impossibly sharper.

"So what do I owe this unannounced pleasure, madam?"

_"I was calling to ask if I might steal Claire away from you for an afternoon. We're having a girl's lunch you see, no boys allowed." _Unless he was mistaken he could definitely hear the sound of helicopter blades in the background and the sound of air whooshing by.

"Wouldn't that be up to her?" He smirked into the phone and in response she snorted.

_"Aren't you taking care of her? I think she thought it wise to ask you beforehand, if it were up to me I'd have gotten her already." _

"I don't see why that would be a problem. I take it you already know where to pick her up at." He responded as he made his way down the corridor to his own office where Claire had been last. Sneaky little woman she was.

_"Would I be me if I didn't?"_

...

She didn't know what she would be expecting as she waited atop the roof of the building for the helicopter buzzing close by. It wasn't Frances she was worried about, she had already spoken to the woman a few times and already it seemed as if they would be getting along quite well. No it was the thin blonde in the passenger side that she was concerned with. She hadn't expected a warm welcome from the girl she hadn't seen in a decade but as the older woman placed the chopper down on the roof and the two stepped out that was exactly what she got.

Completely forgoing Wesker and her grandmother, Sherry Birkin sped towards Claire and tackled her with open arms, nearly bringing them both down and illiciting a loud 'oomph' from the redhead.

"Oh my god, Claire! I had no idea we were coming to see you!" It all left her in such a rush that Claire could have sworn it was more a squeak than actual speaking. Wasting no time she quickly returned the embrace and sighed.

"I missed you too, Sherry," The girls pulled away and Claire finally got a good look at the girl- woman that she hadn't seen since she was nothing more than a frightened little girl looking for her parents in a damned city, "Look at you, you're all grown up!"

"You too! The last time I saw you, you were younger than I am now." Sherry squealed and Claire smiled, trying to blink away the moisture in her eyes.

"Females."

Both women turned to the male voice and Sherry rolled her eyes but still smiled warmly, "Hello to you too, Uncle Albert." Claire's eyebrow rose as Sherry moved over to Wesker and wrapped her arms around him tightly and he froze for a moment before patting her on the back awkwardly.

"My goodness he didn't drop her this time." Frances was next to Claire and she tilted a head in the older woman's direction, a confused look on her features. Frances just smiled in a way that clearly said, 'I'll tell you later'.

After all of the introductions were done and Wesker had gone back down into the building the women were on their way, flying back over Alaska and into Washington. Soon enough they were touching down onto a private helipad where there were a few cars surrounding the area. Sherry was the first to hop out, loudly proclaiming that she was driving and dragging Claire with her.

"Sherry the last time you drove me anywhere I almost had a heart attack," Frances said, joining Claire and Sherry as they made their way towards a deep crimson 2009 Mustang convertible. Frances looked at Claire and rolled her eyes before continuing, "That child is a complete speed demon, just like her father was."

"Daddy was not a speed demon! He drove like an old lady, eh- no offence, Grandma." Sherry must have realized that she wouldn't win the fight and she got into the backseat as Frances and Claire got into the front. Claire had figured that speaking about the deceased William Birkin would be some sort of difficult topic but these two spoke about it so casually, as if he wasn't actually dead.

"Maybe not when he had you in the car but when he was a kid he certainly did. One time he and Albert were racing and that boy crashed right into a ditch. Got the bottom of my car stuck on a huge drainage pipe." Frances rolled her eyes as she started the car but still kept her carefree smile.

"Whoa, Wesker used to race?" Claire couldn't help the laugh that had gotten stuck in her throat. Though it wasn't a totally unusual thing to picture him doing it seemed far too trivial for Wesker to have taken any pleasure in. The thought of Wesker behind the wheel of some supercharged vehicle speeding down the road was one that she had never thought possible, unless of course he was shooting out the tires of someone behind him.

"Oh yeah, both he and Will did when they were younger. Scared the crap out of me on several occasions, the both of them."

"I never would have figured..." Claire spoke more to herself than anyone else, "What did they race?"

"Oh, different sorts of things but Al used to ride his motorcycle a lot. He seemed to favor it more than your standard racing car."

Soon they were turning the corner onto a street that Claire hadn't caught the name of but she wasn't concerned. The sunlight was warm and bright, something that Frances had said was unusual in this city for this time of year and she listened intently on every word the older woman said. She was so engrossed in a story that Frances was telling her about when she first started working at Umbrella that she hadn't even noticed that they were pulling up to an outdoor bistro. It was similar to the kind she figured she might see in Paris, the kind that always seemed to line the streets in the city portrayed in movies. It also looked ridiculously expensive and Claire felt something settle into her stomach with a startling discomfort.

She didn't have any money.

"This place looks pricey..." She said, more to herself than her companions but both caught her slightly distressed sentiment. Sherry patted her on the shoulder and then went off to secure them a table.

"Yes dear but the meaning of 'let me take you to lunch' clearly conveyed that I'll be paying today," Frances smiled as they got out of the car, "I'll hear nothing of it." She added when Claire went to open her mouth.

"Fine but you're going to have to let me return the favor one day."

"Of course, dear."

...

It was quite possibly the best day she had had in a very long time. After they had placed their orders they waited for their food to arrive, talking happily. Frances and Sherry took turns exchanging stories and the three women were caught up in several laughing fits in between. Soon enough the waiter came with their food and not long after Claire took a bite of her sandwich did the subject turn to one that she had been half-heartedly avoiding the whole time.

"So, Claire...the infection, is it high?" Sherry's voice was small and quiet but imploring, curiosity making it seem much louder than it was. For a minute Claire was engrossed in her food and wondered what Sherry meant by that. Of course she had meant her own infection.

"Sherry..." Frances cut her off, her tone was clearly that of a grandmother instead of a friend.

"No...it's okay," Claire smiled reassuringly and Sherry looked intently at her, eyes softening as she watching the redhead, "It's contained but yes, it's pretty high level. Or so I've been told." She added that last part somewhat bitterly though for what reason she didn't know.

"You know, Claire, that night in Raccoon when I got infected and you and Leon gave me the anti-virus...it didn't completely eradicate it." Sherry placed a comforting hand on her arm and Claire's mouth opened slightly.

"That's kind of an oversight, Sherry," Frances interupted, swallowing a bite of salad, "She still holds a sort of latent marker of the virus, it caused an immunity but there's still a very tiny bit bonded with her cells."

"I had no idea..."

"I'm just saying, you're not really as alone as you might think you are. You know, with the whole infection thing." Sherry chimed in, sipping her iced tea.

"T-Veronica, that's a terribly volatile virus. Albert must be treating you like some medical marvel." Claire's gaze snapped to the older woman who had the faintest of smirks on her face, as if she wasn't really that interested in speaking about the virus as much as other things.

"Not really..." Claire's attention shifted to her recently untouched sandwich, overcome with the feeling that this conversation was taking a turn in a direction she really didn't want.

"So why are you staying with Uncle Albert, hmm? Are you two an item?" Sherry smiled broadly and nudged Claire with her elbow as Frances took another bite of her salad and rolled her eyes.

"God no! He's just...helping me out a bit is all."

After that the subject was dropped and Sherry and Claire chatted on about school and other various safe topics but the look that Frances kept shooting her didn't go unnoticed by far. There was something in those eyes that clearly displayed that she knew more than she was letting on and that Claire knew as well but no one would speak of it. Something that she prayed would never be brought up.

Soon after the food was all consumed and the bill was paid - Claire had tried desperately not to look at it but had failed - the three were on their way back to the heliport, much to Sherry's dismay who had exclaimed that Claire needed to come over to their house one day. Frances agreed and so did Claire and when they finally reached the facility in Alaska, Sherry made Claire promise her that she would with a tight hug.

Before she had time to act Claire was pulled into a tight embrace by Frances and melted into the motherly hug that she knew she had needed for many years. Before she pulled away she spoke quietly so that only Claire could hear.

"Things aren't always exactly as they appear on the outside, dear. Remember that."

As the biting cold nipped into Claire she watched the Birkin women drift off over the nearly all white horizon she thought about the words that were just spoken to her and their meaning.

Though she had a feeling that she already knew exactly what that meaning was.

...

"I'm so glad you could join me, Mr. Harper."

He crossed his legs and leaned forward, elbows perched on top of the desk, hands supporting his chin. Anyone looking in might have said that he gave a sense of elegance to the room; others might say it was intimidation he was lending. Unlike his last remaining sibling, he never hid his eyes, not that he needed to. The strange and bright discoloration of his eyes had been ever present since he was originally injected with the Mother Virus and though they were slightly off-putting they weren't so bright that they caused a stir. Albert's eyes had also been quite a bright shade of their original hue. He was a handsome man though unlike his brother, displayed less of that fine chiseled look and more of a boyish charm; women still flocked to him nonetheless.

Right now however, it wasn't elegance or charm that was holding the main office of VitaLife's Ontario headquarters. He shifted slightly, causing the portly man across from him to stiffen and grow even more uncomfortable. When he spoke his voice was that of a fine purr, reverberating around the fine wood walls and the plush red carpeting as if it was an all marble concert hall.

"And how is Angela doing?"

The thick waisted man shifted and began to sweat as he responded, willing his voice to remain calm, "She's doing well, th-the treatment is working well the doctors say."

"Good!" Alex clapped his hands together, "And the girls? Doing well in school?"

"They're good. E-Elaine is taking clarinet lessons."

Alex smiled widely, showing off his perfectly straight, almost too-white teeth. It was predatory and displayed more than just simple pleasantries.

"So the family is doing well, hmm?" The blond got to his feet, causing the balding man to shift nervously again, "I'm so glad to hear it. You know, George, may I call you George? Good. You know, the corporation has put in a lot of resources to ensure that your lovely wife recieve the best care possible. That your girls receive the best educations possible."

"Y-Yes sir-"

"And there have been some interesting stories floating around here, not that I believe mere hearsay of course," He continued, now circling the other man like a shark, not letting him speak for himself, "Which is why I have decided to come to you personally about it but you know, George, security cameras do not lie." He left that last bit to hang and immediately George looked even more uncomfortable. Alex hoped he didn't vomit in his office, he'd hate to have to kill a potentially valuable resource. Though attempting to steal one of his samples was warrant enough for that. George seemed to know he was caught and he began to spew forth some ridiculous excuse that Alex had no interest in hearing.

"Sir! You have to understand, it wasn't my fault I-"

"Oh, but I do understand. And I am willing to overlook this, a no-harm-no-foul agreement if you will, as I am a very generous man."

"Yes sir, of course!"

"But nothing is free, my good man. Especially not advanced healthcare and cancer treatment and wouldn't it just be a shame if the resources simply just...fell through? Do you understand me yet, _George_?"

"Sir, please..."

"Who were you going to sell that sample to, Mr. Harper?" He stopped abruptly, turning his body sharply as if it was a tightly coiled snake ready to lunge. His toxic green eyes seemed impossibly brighter, more lethal looking than the most potent poison.

"Mr. Chairman I swear to you, I had no idea who he was-"

"Well ignorance is apparently bliss, isn't it?" His soft words oozed from his mouth in a way that was more degrading than any amount of yelling. "Nevermind that, there is something I do need you to do though, if you value the health of your family I mean."

He paused a moment, a faux look of his own ignorance playing on his face as he turned to the ever, underhanded George Harper, with his thick, blubbery waist and his unnattractive comb-over, "You do...value the health of your family, don't you Mr. Harper?"

The balding, frightened looking man didn't answer with anything more than a terrified eye-bulge that made him look more like an abused bulldog than a person. Alex suppressed the urge to laugh, that look was just too damn funny.

"Oh, of course you do," He finished for him, bringing his hand down on the trembling man's shoulder, "But you know, you're going to have to show me, George."

"Yes sir, anything sir, just please don't hurt my family."

Alex wrinkled his nose up in disgust. Groveling, really? What a pathetic waste of oxygen this guy was and he had no room in his industry for grovelers. After this job was done he'd see to it that Mr. Harper's talents were put to use somewhere more his speed, like in the testing facility for example.

Shifting his green eyes over to the desk and back to Harper he then moved towards a file sitting on the edge and picked it up. He handed it to Harper, who took it with shaky hands and opened it, slowly reading it and then looking up with eyes wider and sheer disbelief on his face.

Alex's lips tilted in an amused smirk before he set down at the desk once more and pointed to the grandiose clock that hung overhead behind him.

"Tick-tock, Harper. Time is money."

...

_**A/N: I know, I know it's kind of short but umm I wanted to end it there and get started on the next chapter, which may be a bit odd but I'm looking forward to it. It'll be different to say the least. Not to mention I just got finished watching The Phantom of The Opera for like the third time this week - I friggin love Gerard Butler, hawt! - so my mind has been all mushy romantic...anyways. The next chapter is going to have sort of an ode to it, so be ready for that, kind of a little brain sabotage for poor Claire. Reviews are always a nice Christmas gift right? Oh come on...put all of your reviews under my internet tree and umm...me love you long time? **_


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